Biology subjects

Ezawa, T.

Publications and source records attributed to Ezawa, T..

3 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2020

Asymbiotic mass production of the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus Rhizophagus clarus

Arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) symbiosis is a mutually beneficial interaction between fungi and land plants and promotes global phosphate cycling in terrestrial ecosystems. AM fungi are recognised as obligate symbionts that require root colonisation to complete a life cycle involving the production of propagules, asexual spores. Recently it has been shown that Rhizophagus irregularis can produce infection-competent secondary spores asymbiotically by adding a fatty acid, palmitoleic acid. Further, asymbiotic growth can be supported using myristate as a carbon and energy source for their asymbiotic growth to increase fungal biomass. However, spore production and the ability of these spores to colonise host roots were still limited compared to co-culture of the fungus with plant roots. Here we show that a combination of two plant hormones, strigolactone and methyl jasmonate, induces production of a large number of infection-competent spores in asymbiotic cultures of Rhizophagus clarus HR1 in the presence of myristate and organic nitrogen. Inoculation of asymbiotically-generated spores promoted the growth of Welsh onions, as observed for spores produced by symbiotic culture system. Our findings provide a foundation for elucidation of hormonal control of the fungal life cycle and development of new inoculum production schemes.

microbiology↗

bioRxiv2020

Cross-ecosystem transcriptomics identifies distinct genetic modules for nutrient acquisition in maize

Plants have evolved diverse strategies for the acquisition of the macro-nutrients phosphorus and nitrogen; e.g., mycorrhizal formation, root development, and secretion of chelators/hydrolases to liberate inorganic phosphate. Despite the extensive studies on the individual strategies, there is little information about how plants regulate these strategies in response to fluctuating environment. We approached this issue via profiling transcriptomes of plants grown in large environmental gradients. Roots, leaves, and root-zone soils of 251 maize plants were collected across the US Corn Belt and Japan. RNA was extracted from the roots and sequenced, and the leaves and soils were analyzed. Nineteen genetic modules were defined by weighted gene coexpression network analysis and functionally characterized according to gene ontology analysis, by which we found three modules that are directly involved in nutrient acquisition: mycorrhizal formation, phosphate-starvation response (PSR), and root development. Correlation analysis with soil and plant factors revealed that both phosphorus and nitrogen deficiencies upregulated the mycorrhizal module, whereas the PSR module was upregulated mainly by deficiency in phosphorus relative to nitrogen. Expression levels of the root development module were negatively correlated with those of the mycorrhizal module, suggesting that nutrient acquisition through the two pathways, mycorrhizas and roots, are opposite strategies that are employed under nutrient-deficient and -enriched conditions, respectively. The identification of the soil and plant factors that drive the modules has implications for sustainable agriculture; activation/optimization of the strategies is feasible via manipulating the factors. Overall, our study opens a new window for understanding plant response to complex environments.

plant biology↗

bioRxiv2020

Conservation and host-specific expression of non-tandemly repeated heterogenous ribosome RNA gene in arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi

The ribosomal RNA-encoding gene (rDNA) has a characteristic genomic nature: tens to thousands of copies in a genome, tandemly repeated structure, and intragenomic sequence homogeneity. These features contribute to ribosome productivity via physiological and evolutionary processes. We reported previously the exceptional absence of these features in the model arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungus Rhizophagus irregularis. Here we examine the phylogenetic distribution of the exceptional rDNA features in the genus Rhizophagus via improving the genome sequence of R. clarus. Cross-species comparison indicated similarity of their rDNAs not only in the genomic features but also in the distribution of intragenomic polymorphic sites on the paralogs. Ribosomal RNA comprises multiple domains with different functions. The two Rhizophagus species commonly exhibited a variation enrichment site, ES27L, which is related to translational fidelity and antibiotic sensitivity. Variation enrichment on ES27L has not been observed in other organisms lacking the three rDNA features such as malaria parasites and Cyanidioschyzon merolae. Expression profiling of rDNAs in R. irregularis revealed that rDNA paralogs are expressed differently in association with host plant species. Our results suggest a broad distribution of the disarranged rDNA across AM fungi and its involvement in the successful association with the broad range of host species.

genomics↗