Eisosomal proteins are essential for plant-fungal interaction of Neurospora crassa and the sweetgrass Brachypodium distachyon.
Winter H, Kempken F
Plant Fungal Symbiosis
Fungi living invisibly inside grass roots without causing harm may be far more common than we thought, hinting that the soil beneath your lawn or meadow garden is woven through with partnerships we've barely begun to map.
Researchers found that a well-studied bread mold, long thought to only break down dead plant material, can actually live peacefully inside living grass roots. They then hunted through the fungus's genetic toolkit to find what makes this possible, and discovered that two proteins sitting in small pockets of the fungal cell membrane are absolutely required for the fungus to get inside the plant. Without those two proteins, the fungus simply cannot colonize the roots at all.
Key Findings
Neurospora crassa, previously classified as strictly saprotrophic (feeding only on dead matter), colonizes roots and vascular bundles of Brachypodium distachyon without triggering disease symptoms.
Deletion of either ncw-6 or div-23—two proteins localized to eisosomes (plasma membrane microdomains)—completely abolished root colonization, while disrupting MAP kinase and NADPH oxidase signaling pathways did not.
This is the first report implicating eisosome-associated proteins as essential components of a plant-fungal interaction, suggesting eisosomes may play a broad role in how fungi interface with living plant tissue.
chevron_right Technical Summary
Scientists discovered that a common bread mold (Neurospora crassa) can quietly live inside the roots of a grass without causing disease, and identified two specific proteins—located in specialized membrane compartments called eisosomes—that are essential for the fungus to establish this peaceful partnership.
Abstract Preview
Plant fungal associations encompass a continuum from pathogenic to mutualistic interactions that have profoundly shaped terrestrial ecosystems. The ability of fungi to colonize living plant tissues...
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Brachypodium is a genus of plants in the grass family, widespread across much of Africa, Eurasia, and Latin America. The genus is classified in its own tribe Brachypodieae.