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Biocontrol Potential of Trichoderma afroharzianum TM24 Against Grey Mould on Tomato Plants

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Abstract

Grey mould caused by Botrytis cinerea leads to severe economic loss on commercial tomato production. Application of beneficial microorganism offers an eco-friendly alternative for mitigation of tomato fungal disease damage, considering negative influences of fungicides. In the present study, an antagonistic Trichoderma afroharzianum isolate TM24 was evaluated for its biocontrol potential on tomato grey mould. The isolate TM24 showed obviously antagonistic effect on B. cinerea mycelium growth and production of glucanase and chitinase. Leaf spraying with spore suspension of isolate TM24 showed a biocontrol efficiency of over 54% against tomato grey mould in greenhouse pot experiment. The activities of plant defense-related enzymes including polyphenol oxidase, phenylalanine ammonialyase, superoxide dismutase, and peroxidase were all increased to varying degrees in tomato leaves after isolate TM24 treatment. Transcriptome analysis showed that, a total of 1941, 1753 and 38 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were obtained at 24, 48 and 72 hpi, respectively, in tomato leaves pretreated with T. afroharzianum TM24, and then challenged with B. cinerea inoculation. The DEGs were mainly enriched in MAPK signaling pathway and plant hormones signal transduction pathway. Multiple genes that regulated crucial nodes of defense-related pathways, like flavonoid, phenylpropanoid, jasmonic acid and ethylene metabolisms were also identified, which may have positive correlations with the biocontrol potential of isolate TM24 in tomato plants. These promising results provided valuable information on using T. afroharzianum TM24 as a beneficial biocontrol agent in tomato grey mould management.

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Data Availability

The RNA-seq data were saved as FASTQ files, and deposited into National Center for Biotechnology Information under accession numbers of BioProject PRJNA666988 and BioSample SAMN16339768-16339785.

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Acknowledgements

This study was mainly funded by the Beijing Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences (BAAFS), China.

Funding

This research was funded by the Youth Research Fund of Beijing Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences (QNJJ201814), the Beijing Natural Science Foundation (6192008), the Innovative Capacity Construction of Beijing Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences (KJCX20200110, KJCX20200426), and Beijing Key Laboratory of Green Control of Fruit Tree Diseases and Pests in the North China (BZ0432).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Plant and Environment Protection, Beijing Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences, Beijing, 100097, People’s Republic of China

    Juan Zhao, Ting Liu, Dianpeng Zhang, Huiling Wu, Taotao Zhang & Dan Dong

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  1. Juan Zhao
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  2. Ting Liu
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  3. Dianpeng Zhang
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  4. Huiling Wu
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  5. Taotao Zhang
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  6. Dan Dong
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Contributions

JZ and TL conceived and designed the research. JZ and DPZ constructed the experiments and analyzed the data. JZ, HLW, TTZ, and DD conducted the experiments.

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Correspondence to Ting Liu.

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Zhao, J., Liu, T., Zhang, D. et al. Biocontrol Potential of Trichoderma afroharzianum TM24 Against Grey Mould on Tomato Plants. Curr Microbiol 78, 4115–4126 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00284-021-02671-x

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