RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) are essential for regulating RNA metabolism, stability, and translation within cells. Recent studies have shown that RBPs not restricted to intracellular functions can be found in extracellular vesicles (EVs) different mammalian EVs released by fungi contain a variety of involved metabolism. These include helicases, which play roles synthesis, folding, degradation. A...

Hypovirulence in fungal plant pathogens refers to the reduced ability of selected isolates within a population of a pathogen to infect, colonize, kill, and (or) reproduce on susceptible host tissues and is often associated with fungal viruses and associated double-stranded RNA elements. It has been reported to occur in numerous fungal plant pathogens, including Sclerotinia sclerotiorum, S. mino...

Fusarium graminearum is a major fungal pathogen of cereals worldwide, causing seedling, stem base and floral diseases, including Fusarium head blight (FHB). In addition to yield and quality losses, FHB contaminates cereal grain with mycotoxins, including deoxynivalenol, which are harmful to human, animal and ecosystem health. Currently, FHB control is only partially effective due to several int...

Head blight, which is caused by mycotoxin-producing fungi of the genus Fusarium, is an economically important crop disease. We assessed the potential of host-induced gene silencing targeting the fungal cytochrome P450 lanosterol C-14α-demethylase (CYP51) genes, which are essential for ergosterol biosynthesis, to restrict fungal infection. In axenic cultures of Fusarium graminearum, in vitro fee...

Fusarium oxysporum is a devastating pathogen causing extensive yield losses in a variety of crops and development of sustainable, environmentally friendly methods to improve crop resistance is crucial. We have used Host-Delivered RNA interference (HD-RNAi) technology to partially silence three different genes (FOW2, FRP1, and OPR) in the hemi-biotrophic fungus F. oxysporum f. sp. conglutinans. ...

Fungal tRNA ligase (Trl1) is an essential enzyme that repairs RNA breaks with 2',3'-cyclic-PO4 and 5'-OH ends inflicted during tRNA splicing and non-canonical mRNA splicing in the fungal unfolded protein response. Trl1 is composed of C-terminal cyclic phosphodiesterase and central polynucleotide kinase domains that heal the broken ends to generate the 3'-OH,2'-PO4 and 5'-PO4 termini required fo...

The continuous cropping of cucumber in the same potting soils may result in a reduction of yield and quality of the crop, a phenomenon described as soil sickness. The changes of soil microbial communities as affected by continuous cropping and the link between these changes and soil sickness of cucumber are still not clear. In the present study, cucumber was cropped in pots under greenhouse con...

All double-stranded RNA viruses have capsid-associated RNA polymerase activities. In the reoviruses, the transcriptase synthesizes the viral plus strand in a conservative mode and the replicase synthesizes the viral minus strand, again conservatively. In bacteriophage phi 6 and in some fungal viruses, the transcriptase activity is semiconservative, acting by displacement synthesis. In this work...

Plant-fungal symbioses are a common feature in nature. They vary from pathogenic interactions, where fungi subvert plant resources for their own use, to mutualistic associations, where both fungus and host benefit from the interaction. Although the ecological importance of plant-fungal symbioses has long been recognized and the biology of several key associations are now well studied, new techn...