Functional Analysis Of Autophagy-related Genes MgATG11,MgATG13 And MgATG17 In Magnaporthe Oryzae

Rice blast, caused by Magnaporthe oryzae, is one of the most serious diseases of the cultivated rice and has affected the yield and quality of the cultivated rice in the worldwide. As a model organism for the investigation of molecular biology and pathogenesis of filamentous fungus, Magnaporthe oryzae has a typical life history and infection cycle. The genome sequence project of Magnaporthe oryzae has been completed, it convenientes the research of gene function, and makes it as a model organism of pathogen-host (rice) interaction research. The study on gene function and pathogen-host interaction of Magnaporthe oryzae may provide a noble way to the prevention of rice blast disease.Autophagy is a ubiquitous and evolutionarily conserved process in eukaryotic organisms. And autophagy is a way of the degradation of the contents in cytoplasmic dependent on lysosomal or vacuolar. Autophagy has been presumed to be involved in appressorium formation, conidial production, conidial germination and infection. Functional researches of autophagy-related genes in rice blast may elucidate its mechanisms of pathogenicity.In our research, we cloned MgATG11. MgATG13 and MgATG17 of Magnaporthe oryzae, homologous of countpart in Saccharomyces cerevisiae, constructed the gene knockout vector, and got the deletion mutantsΔmgatg11.Δmgatg13,Δmgatg17,ΔΔmgatg17mgatg11,ΔΔmgatg17mgatg13. Finally, We carried out the phenotype and pathogenicity assays of the mutants and co-expression of MgATG11, MgATG13 and MgATG17 with green fluorescent protein.Deletion of MgATG11, MgATG13 and MgATG17 has no obvious changes in the phenotype and pathogenicity of Magnaporthe oryzae. However, double deletion of MgATG11 and MgATG17, MgATG13 and MgATG17, respectively, can lead to significant changes of spore production and pathogenicity of the rice blast fungus, Magnaporthe oryzae. It is the first time, we found that double deletion of MgATG11, MgATG17 and double deletion of MgATG13, MgATG17 can lead to the reduction of spore production, the delayed of conidial germination, and the reduction of pathogenicity to rice and barley.