Cloning of insertion site flanking sequence and construction of transfer DNA insert mutant library in Stylosanthes colletotrichum

PLoS One. 2014 Oct 31;9(10):e111172. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0111172. eCollection 2014.

Abstract

Stylosanthes sp. is the most important forage legume in tropical areas worldwide. Stylosanthes anthracnose, which is mainly caused by Colletotrichum gloeosporioides, is a globally severe disease in stylo production. Little progress has been made in anthracnose molecular pathogenesis research. In this study, Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated transformation was used to transform Stylosanthes colletotrichum strain CH008. The major factors of the genetic transformation system of S. colletotrichum were optimized as follows: A. tumefaciens' AGL-1 concentration (OD(600)), 0.8; concentration of Colletotrichum conidium, 1 × 10(6) conidia/mL; acetosyringone concentration, 100 mmol/L; induction time, 6 h; co-culture temperature, 25 °C; and co-culture time, 3 d. Thus, the transformation efficiency was increased to 300-400 transformants per 106 conidia. Based on the optimized system, a mutant library containing 4616 mutants was constructed, from which some mutants were randomly selected for analysis. Results show that the mutants were single copies that could be stably inherited. The growth rate, spore amount, spore germination rate, and appressorium formation rate in some mutants were significantly different from those in the wild-type strain. We then selected the most appropriate method for the preliminary screening and re-screening of each mutant's pathogenic defects. We selected 1230 transformants, and obtained 23 strains with pathogenic defects, namely, 18 strains with reduced pathogenicity and five strains with lost pathogenicity. Thermal asymmetric interlaced PCR was used to identify the transfer DNA (T-DNA) integration site in the mutant that was coded 2430, and a sequence of 476 bp was obtained. The flanking sequence of T-DNA was compared with the Colletotrichum genome by BLAST, and a sequence of 401 bp was found in Contig464 of the Colletotrichum genome. By predicting the function of the flanking sequence, we discovered that T-DNA insertion in the promoter region of the putative gene had 79% homology with the aspartate aminotransferase gene in Magnaporthe oryzae (XP_003719674.1).

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Agrobacterium tumefaciens / genetics
  • Aspartate Aminotransferases / genetics
  • Cloning, Molecular
  • Coculture Techniques
  • Colletotrichum / genetics*
  • Colletotrichum / pathogenicity
  • DNA Transposable Elements
  • Fabaceae / microbiology
  • Genetic Vectors
  • Genome, Fungal*
  • Genomic Library*
  • Mutagenesis, Insertional*
  • Promoter Regions, Genetic
  • Spores, Fungal / genetics
  • Transformation, Genetic

Substances

  • DNA Transposable Elements
  • Aspartate Aminotransferases

Grants and funding

We thank the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC, No. 31072076), Special Fund for Agro-scientific Research in the Public Interest (201303057) and The Major Technology Project of Hainan (ZDZX2013023-1) for funding this research. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.