Common Accommodation Mechanisms for Mutualistic and Pathogenic Fungi in Rice
C. IBE (1) (1) University of Cambridge, United Kingdom

Rice roots have widespread associations with both beneficial and pathogenic fungi. What is intriguing and yet unanswered is how rice is able to devise mechanisms that allow it to associate with soil nutrient delivering fungi of the Glomeromycota (e.g. Rhizophagus irregularis), whilst simultaneously defending itself against pathogenic fungi such as Magnaporthe oryzae, the causative agent of rice blast disease. Both fungi intracellularly colonize rice root cells and cause a substantial remodeling of host cell architecture to accommodate specialized infection structures.  The beneficial fungus, R. irregularis forms arbuscules within colonized root cells, enveloped by a plant-derived periarbuscular membrane (PAM) that facilitates nutrient and signal exchange. Root invasion by M. oryzae also largely includes intracellularly proliferating hyphae, surrounded by a plant-derived extra-hyphal membrane (EHM). Transcriptomic analysis revealed a set of genes that are simultaneously induced during R. irregularis and M. oryzae intracellular colonization of rice roots. The temporal and spatial characterization of the expression of a rice Exo70 exocyst protein and a lectin receptor-like kinase during colonization of rice roots with R. irregularis and M. oryzae to inform about the subcellular events during intracellular colonization by either fungus is the goal of this study. Time-lapse live-cell imaging (using 2-photon and confocal scanning laser microscopy) of rice subcellular marker lines colonized with R. irregularis and M. oryzae will be performed and used to generate data sets for the construction of 4D models of colonization events by both fungi.

Abstract Number: P1-5
Session Type: Poster