AUTHOR=Zhu Guining , Deng Yizhen , Cai Enping , Yan Meixin , Cui Guobing , Wang Zhiqiang , Zou Chengwu , Zhang Bin , Xi Pinggen , Chang Changqing , Chen Baoshan , Jiang Zide 

TITLE=Identification and Functional Analysis of the Pheromone Response Factor Gene of Sporisorium scitamineum

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Microbiology

VOLUME=10

YEAR=2019

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/microbiology/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2019.02115

DOI=10.3389/fmicb.2019.02115

ISSN=1664-302X

ABSTRACT=<p>The sugarcane smut fungus <italic>Sporisorium scitamineum</italic> is bipolar and produces sporidia of two different mating types. During infection, haploid cells of opposite mating types can fuse to form dikaryotic hyphae that can colonize plant tissue. Mating and filamentation are therefore essential for <italic>S. scitamineum</italic> pathogenesis. In this study, we obtained one T-DNA insertion mutant disrupted in the gene encoding the pheromone response factor (Prf1), hereinafter named <italic>SsPRF1</italic>, of <italic>S. scitamineum</italic>, via <italic>Agrobacterium tumefaciens</italic>-mediated transformation (ATMT) mutagenesis. Targeted deletion of <italic>SsPRF1</italic> resulted in mutants with phenotypes similar to the T-DNA insertion mutant, including failure to mate with a compatible wild-type partner strain and being non-pathogenic on its host sugarcane. qRT-PCR analyses showed that <italic>SsPRF1</italic> was essential for the transcription of pheromone-responsive mating type genes of the <italic>a1</italic> locus. These results show that <italic>SsPRF1</italic> is involved in mating and pathogenicity and plays a key role in pheromone signaling and filamentous growth in <italic>S. scitamineum</italic>.</p>