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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Fungal Biol.
Sec. Fungi-Plant Interactions
Volume 5 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/ffunb.2024.1436759
This article is part of the Research Topic Plant-Friendly Microorganisms as a Bio-Barrier Against Pathogens View all articles

Antagonistic Interactions between Maize Seeds Microbiome Species and the Late Wilt Disease Agent, Magnaporthiopsis maydis

Provisionally accepted
Ofir Degani Ofir Degani 1,2*Aseel Ayoub Aseel Ayoub 2Elhanan Dimant Elhanan Dimant 1Asaf Gordani Asaf Gordani 1,2
  • 1 Plant Sciences Department, Migal - Galilee Research Institute, Qiryat Shemona, Israel
  • 2 Faculty of Sciences, Tel-Hai College, Tel-Hai, Israel

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Magnaporthiopsis maydis is a maize pathogen that causes severe damage to commercial corn fields in the late growth stages. Late wilt disease (LWD) has spread since its discovery in the 1960s in Egypt and is now reported in about 10 countries. The pathogen has a hidden endophytic lifecycle in resistant corn plants and secondary hosts such as foxtail, watermelon lupin and cotton. At the same time, it could be an opportunist and hinder the host development under the right conditions. This study uncovered M. maydis interactions with newly identified maize endophytes. To this end, six fungi were isolated from the seeds of three sweet corn cultivars having varying susceptibility to LWD. These isolates were identified using colony morphology and microscopic characterization, universal internal transcribed spacer (ITS) molecular targeting and phylogenetic analysis. Most of them belonged to pathogenic species. Compared to three previously identified bioprotective microorganisms, the new species were tested for their ability to secrete metabolites that repress M. maydis in vitro and to antagonize it in a solid media confront test and a seedlings pathogenicity assay. The opportunistic fungal species Aspergillus flavus (ME1), Aspergillus terreus (PE3) and the reference biocontrol bacteria Bacillus subtilis (R2) achieved the highest M. maydis inhibition degree in the plates tests (74-100% inhibition). The seedlings' pathogenicity assay that predicts the seeds' microflora resistance to M. maydis highlighted the bio-shielding potential of most species (23% or more epicotyl elongation over the infected control). Fusarium sp. (ME2) was the leading species in this measure (43% enhancement), and B. subtilis gave the best protection in terms of seeds' germination (50%) and sprouts' biomass (34%). The results of this study could enhance our understanding of the pathobiome's role in the context of LWD and represent a first step in using the seeds' natural protective microflora to develop novel management strategies.

    Keywords: assay, Cephalosporium maydis, crop protection, Endophytes, fungus, Harpophora maydis, microflora, plate confrontation

    Received: 22 May 2024; Accepted: 15 Jul 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Degani, Ayoub, Dimant and Gordani. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Ofir Degani, Plant Sciences Department, Migal - Galilee Research Institute, Qiryat Shemona, Israel

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