Root-associated entomopathogenic fungi modulate their host plant’s photosystem ii photochemistry and response to herbivorous insects
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The escalating food demand and loss to herbivores has led to increasing interest in using resistance-inducing microbes for pest control. Here, we evaluated whether root-inoculation with fungi that are otherwise known as entomopathogens improves tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) leaflets’ reaction to herbivory by Spodoptera exigua (beet armyworm) larvae using chlorophyll fluorescence imaging. Plants were inoculated with Metarhizium brunneum or Beauveria bassiana, and photosystem II reactions were evaluated before and after larval feeding. Before herbivory, the fraction of absorbed light energy used for photochemistry (ΦPSII) was lower in M. brunneum-inoculated than in control plants, but not in B. bassiana-inoculated plants. After herbivory, however, ΦPSII increased in the fungal-inoculated plants compared with that before herbivory, similar to the reaction of control plants. At the same time, the fraction of energy dissipated as heat (ΦNPQ) decreased in the inoculated plants, resulting in an increased fraction of nonregulated energy loss (ΦNO) in M. brunneum. This indicates an increased singlet oxygen (1 O2) formation not detected in B. bassiana-inoculated plants, showing that the two entomopathogenic fungi differentially modulate the leaflets’ response to herbivory. Overall, our results show that M. brunneum inoculation had a negative effect on the photosynthetic efficiency before herbivory, while B. bassiana inoculation had no significant effect. However, S. exigua leaf biting activated the same compensatory PSII response mechanism in tomato plants of both fungal-inoculated treatments as in control plants.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 207 |
Journal | Molecules |
Volume | 27 |
Issue number | 1 |
Number of pages | 16 |
ISSN | 1420-3049 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2022 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:
Funding: This research was funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and Innovation programme, Microbe Induced Resistance to Agricultural Pests (MiRA), Grant agreement No 765290.
Funding Information:
This research was funded by the European Union?s Horizon 2020 research and Innovation programme, Microbe Induced Resistance to Agricultural Pests (MiRA), Grant agreement No 765290. The authors would like to thank Michael Moustakas (Department of Botany, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki) for providing the Chlorophyll Fluorometer used in this study.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
- Beauveria bassiana, Chlorophyll fluorescence imaging, Compensatory process, Herbivory costs, Metarhizium brunneum, Non-photochemical quenching, Photosynthetic efficiency, Singlet oxygen, Solanum lycopersicum, Spodoptera exigua
Research areas
ID: 289390981