Environmental Microbiology (2018) 20, 293-304

Yixiong Chen, Bing Li, Kai Cen, Yuzhen Lu, Siwei Zhang and Chengshu Wang (2018)
Diverse effect of phosphatidylcholine biosynthetic genes on phospholipid homeostasis, cell autophagy and fungal developments in Metarhizium robertsii
Environmental Microbiology 20 (1), 293-304
Abstract: Phosphatidylcholine (PC) plays an important role in maintaining membrane integrity and functionality. In this study, two key genes (Mrpct and Mrpem) putatively involved in the cytidine diphosphate (CDP)-choline and phosphatidylethanolamine N-methyltransferase (PEMT) pathways for PC biosynthesis were characterized in the insect pathogenic fungus Metarhizium robertsii. The results indicated that disruption of Mrpct did not lead to any reduction of total PC content but impaired fungal virulence and increased cellular accumulation of triacylglycerol. Deletion of Mrpem reduced PC content and impaired fungal conidiation and infection structure differentiation but did not result in virulence defects. Lipidomic analysis revealed that deletion of Mrpct and Mrpem resulted in dissimilar effects on increase and decrease of PC moieties and other phospholipid species accumulations. Interestingly, we found that these two genes played opposite roles in activation of cell autophagy when the fungi were grown in a nutrient-rich medium. The connection between PC metabolism and autophagy was confirmed because PC content was drastically reduced in Mratg8Δ and that the addition of PC could rescue null mutant sporulation defect. The results of this study facilitate the understanding of PC metabolism on fungal physiology.
(The abstract is excluded from the Creative Commons licence and has been copied with permission by the publisher.)
Link to article at publishers website
Database assignments for author(s): Chengshu Wang

Research topic(s) for pests/diseases/weeds:
biocontrol - natural enemies
Research topic(s) for beneficials or antagonists:
molecular biology - genes

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Pest and/or beneficial records:

Beneficial	Pest/Disease/Weed	Crop/Product	Country	Quarant.
Metarhizium robertsii (entomopathogen)