Genome-wide transcriptional profiling of appressorium development by the rice blast fungus Magnaporthe oryzae.

addresses: College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom.notes: PMCID: PMC3276559The rice blast fungus Magnaporthe oryzae is one of the most significant pathogens affecting global food security. To cause rice blast disease the fungus elaborates a specialised infection structure called an appressorium. Here, we report genome wide transcriptional profile analysis of appressorium development using next generation sequencing (NGS). We performed both RNA-Seq and High-Throughput SuperSAGE analysis to compare the utility of these procedures for identifying differential gene expression in M. oryzae. We then analysed global patterns of gene expression during appressorium development. We show evidence for large-scale gene expression changes, highlighting the role of autophagy, lipid metabolism and melanin biosynthesis in appressorium differentiation. We reveal the role of the Pmk1 MAP kinase as a key global regulator of appressorium-associated gene expression. We also provide evidence for differential expression of transporter-encoding gene families and specific high level expression of genes involved in quinate uptake and utilization, consistent with pathogen-mediated perturbation of host metabolism during plant infection. When considered together, these data provide a comprehensive high-resolution analysis of gene expression changes associated with cellular differentiation that will provide a key resource for understanding the biology of rice blast disease

CfT-1, An LTR-Retrotransposon in Cladosporium fulvum, a fungal pathogen of tomato

A retrotransposon from the fungal tomato pathogen Cladosporium fulvum (syn. Fulvia fulva) has been isolated and characterised. It is 6968 by in length and bounded by identical long terminal repeats of 427 bp; 5 by target-site duplications were found. Putative first- and second-strand primer binding sites were identified. Three long open reading frames (ORFs) are predicted from the sequence. The first has homology to retroviral gag genes. The second includes sequences homologous to protease, reverse transcriptase, RNAse H and integrase, in that order. Sequence comparisons of the predicted ORFs indicate that this element is closely related to the gypsy class of LTR retrotransposons. Races of the pathogen exhibit polymorphisms in their complement of at least 25 copies of the sequence. Virus-like particles which co-sediment with reverse transcriptase activity were observed in homogenates of the fungus. This is the first report of an LTR retrotransposon in a filamentous fungus