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Isolation and functional analysis of the pathogenicity-related gene VdPR3 from Verticillium dahliae on cotton

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Abstract

The fungal plant pathogen Verticillium dahliae is the causal agent of vascular wilt, a disease that can seriously diminish cotton fiber yield. The pathogenicity mechanism and the identity of the genes that interact with cotton during the infection process still remain unclear. In this study, we investigated the low-pathogenic, non-microsclerotium-producing mutant vdpr3 obtained in a previous study from the screening of a T-DNA insertional library of the highly virulent isolate Vd080; the pathogenicity-related gene (VdPR3) in wild-type strain Vd080 was cloned. Knockout mutants (ΔVdPR3) showed lower mycelium growth and obvious reduction in sporulation ability without microsclerotium formation. An evaluation of carbon utilization in mutants and wild-type isolate Vd080 demonstrated that mutants-lacking VdPR3 exhibited decreased cellulase and amylase activities, which was restored in the complementary mutants (ΔVdPR3-C) to levels similar to those of Vd080. ΔVdPR3 postponed infectious events in cotton and showed a significant reduction in pathogenicity. Reintroduction of a functional VdPR3 copy into ΔVdPR3-C restored the ability to infect cotton plants. These results suggest that VdPR3 is a multifunctional gene involved in growth development, extracellular enzyme activity, and virulence of V. dahliae on cotton.

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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank National Science Foundation of China (No. 31201466) and the National High-tech R and D Program of China (863 Program) (No. 2013AA102601) for the financial support.

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We declared that no conflict of interest exists.

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    Authors and Affiliations

    1. State Key Laboratory of Cotton Biology, Institute of Cotton Research of Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Anyang, 455000, Henan, China

      Ya-Lin Zhang, Zhi-Fang Li, Zi-Li Feng, Hong-Jie Feng, Li-Hong Zhao, Yong-Qiang Shi & He-Qin Zhu

    2. State Key Laboratory of Crop Stress Biology for Arid Areas, College of Plant Protection, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, 712100, Shaanxi, China

      Xiao-Ping Hu

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    1. Ya-Lin Zhang
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    Correspondence to Xiao-Ping Hu or He-Qin Zhu.

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    Communicated by Z. Zhang.

    Ya-Lin Zhang and Zhi-Fang Li contributed equally to this work.

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    Zhang, YL., Li, ZF., Feng, ZL. et al. Isolation and functional analysis of the pathogenicity-related gene VdPR3 from Verticillium dahliae on cotton. Curr Genet 61, 555–566 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00294-015-0476-z

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