The Archaeorhizomycetes are recently discovered fungi with poorly resolved ecology. Even their abundance in soil fungal communities is currently disputed. Here we applied a PCR-independent, RNA-based metatranscriptomic approach to determine their abundance among fungi in eleven different soils across Europe. Using small subunit (SSU) ribosomal RNA transcripts as marker, we detected Archaeorhizo...

Fungi grown in pure cultures produce DNA- or RNA-containing particles smaller than spore size (<1.5 microm). High exposures to fungi and bacteria are observed at biofuel plants. Airborne cultivable bacteria are often described to be present in clusters or associated with larger particles with an aerodynamic diameter (d(ae)) of 2-8 microm. In this study, we investigate whether airborne fungal co...

Ectomycorrhizal (EM) fungi form symbiotic associations with plant roots that regulate nutrient exchange between forest plants and soil. Environmental metagenomics approaches that employ next-generation sequencing show great promise for studying EM symbioses; however, metatranscriptomic studies have been constrained by the inherent difficulties associated with isolation and sequencing of RNA fro...

Analysis of virus-derived small RNAs with high-throughput sequencing has been successful for detecting novel viruses in plants and invertebrates. However, the applicability of this method has not been demonstrated in fungi, although fungi were among the first organisms reported to utilize RNA silencing. Here, we used virus-infected isolates of the fungal species complex Heterobasidion annosum s...

RNA silencing can function as a virus defense mechanism in a diverse range of eukaryotes, and many viruses are capable of suppressing the silencing machinery targeting them. However, the extent to which this occurs between fungal RNA silencing and mycoviruses is unclear. Here, three Aspergillus dsRNA mycoviruses were partially characterized, and their relationship to RNA silencing was investiga...

We describe here a double-stranded RNA mycovirus, termed Fusarium graminearum alternavirus 1 (FgAV1/AH11), from the isolate AH11 of the phytopathogenic fungus F. graminearum Phylogenetic analysis showed that FgAV1/AH11 belongs to a newly proposed family, Alternaviridae This is the first report of a mycovirus in the family Alternaviridae that infects F. graminearum.

The preformed messenger ribonucleic acid in Botryodiplodia theobromae spores directs the synthesis of several relatively stable polypeptides

BACKGROUND Within the root endosphere, fungi are known to be important for plant nutrition and resistance to stresses. However, description and understanding of the rules governing community assembly in the fungal fraction of the plant microbiome remains scarce. METHODS We used an innovative DNA- and RNA-based analysis of co-extracted nucleic acids to reveal the complexity of the fungal commu...

Many cultivated and wild grass species are hosts to mutualistic fungal endophytes. These associations are ecologically and agronomically significant, yet little is known regarding the physiological aspects of the interaction. In the Poa amp/a/Acremonium typhinum interaction, a fungal serine proteinase, Atl, is surprisingly abundant and may constitute 1 to 2% of the total leaf-sheath protein. Se...

Entomopathogenic fungi represent a promising class of bio-insecticides for mosquito control. Thus, detailed knowledge of the molecular mechanisms governing anti-fungal immune response in mosquitoes is essential. In this study, we show that CLSP2 is a modulator of immune responses during anti-fungal infection in the mosquito Aedes aegypti. With a fungal infection, the expression of the CLSP2 gen...