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A Potential Involvement of Metallothionein in the Zinc Tolerance of Trichoderma harzianum: Experimental Findings

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Abstract

Metallothioneins are a group of cysteine-rich proteins that play an important role in the homeostasis and detoxification of heavy metals. The objective of this research was to explore the significance of metallothionein in Trichoderma harzianum tolerance to zinc. At the inhibitory concentration of 1000 ppm, the fungus adsorbed 16.7 ± 0.4 mg/g of metal. The HPLC and SDS-PAGE electrophoresis data suggested that the fungus production of metallothionein was twice as high in the presence of zinc as in the control group. The examination of the genes; metallothionein expression activator (MEA) and Cu fist revealed that the MEA, with a C2H2 zinc finger domain, increased significantly in the presence of zinc. It was observed that in T. harzianum, the enhanced expression of the metallothionein gene was managed by the metallothionein activator under zinc overload conditions. According to our knowledge, this is the first report on the role of metallothionein in the resistance of T. harzianum to zinc.

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Funding

Bu-Ali Sina University supported the investigation financially.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture, Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran

    Negin Ejmalian & Soheila Mirzaei

  2. Department of Biotechnology, Faculty of Agriculture, Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran

    Asghar Mirzaie-Asl

  3. Department of Seed and Plant Improvement Research, Hamedan Agricultural and Natural Resources, Research and Education Center, Agricultural Research, Education and Extension Organization, Hamedan, Iran

    Mehrdad chaichi

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  1. Negin Ejmalian
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Contributions

Conceptualization, S.M. and N.E.; methodology, formal analysis, and investigation, N.E., S.M., A.M. and M.C.; data curation, N.E. and S.M.; writing—original draft preparation, S.M.; writing—review and editing, N.E., S.M., A.M. and M.C.; supervision, S.M. and A.M.; funding acquisition, S.M. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Soheila Mirzaei.

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Ejmalian, N., Mirzaei, S., Mirzaie-Asl, A. et al. A Potential Involvement of Metallothionein in the Zinc Tolerance of Trichoderma harzianum: Experimental Findings. Protein J (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10930-024-10185-1

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