AUTHOR=Wang Yan , Wang Liwei , Suo Meng , Qiu Zhijie , Wu Hao , Zhao Min , Yang Hongyan 

TITLE=Regulating Root Fungal Community Using Mortierella alpina for Fusarium oxysporum Resistance in Panax ginseng

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Microbiology

VOLUME=13

YEAR=2022

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/microbiology/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2022.850917

DOI=10.3389/fmicb.2022.850917

ISSN=1664-302X

ABSTRACT=<p>Plant-associated microbes play important roles in plant health and disease. <italic>Mortierella</italic> is often found in the plant rhizosphere, and its possible functions are not well known, especially in medical plants. <italic>Mortierella alpina</italic> isolated from ginseng soil was used to investigate its effects on plant disease. The promoting properties and interactions with rhizospheric microorganisms were investigated in a medium. Further, a pot experiment was conducted to explore its effects on ginseng root rot disease. Physicochemical properties, high-throughput sequencing, network co-occurrence, distance-based redundancy analysis (db-RDA), and correlation analysis were used to evaluate their effects on the root rot pathogen. The results showed that <italic>Mortierella alpina</italic> YW25 had a high indoleacetic acid production capacity, and the maximum yield was 141.37 mg/L at 4 days. The growth of <italic>M. alpina</italic> YW25 was inhibited by some probiotics (<italic>Bacillus</italic>, <italic>Streptomyces</italic>, <italic>Brevibacterium</italic>, <italic>Trichoderma</italic>, etc.) and potential pathogens (<italic>Cladosporium</italic>, <italic>Aspergillus</italic>, etc.), but it did not show sensitivity to the soil-borne pathogen <italic>Fusarium oxysporum</italic>. Pot experiments showed that <italic>M. alpina</italic> could significantly alleviate the diseases caused by <italic>F. oxysporum</italic>, and increased the available nitrogen and phosphorus content in rhizosphere soil. In addition, it enhanced the activities of soil sucrase and acid phosphatase. High-throughput results showed that the inoculation of <italic>M. alpina</italic> with <italic>F. oxysporum</italic> changed the microbial community structure of ginseng, stimulated the plant to recruit more plant growth-promoting bacteria, and constructed a more stable microbial network of ginseng root. In this study, we found and proved the potential of <italic>M. alpina</italic> as a biocontrol agent against <italic>F. oxysporum</italic>, providing a new idea for controlling soil-borne diseases of ginseng by regulating rhizosphere microorganisms.</p>