Fungi Inhabiting the Wheat Endosphere

Abstract

Wheat production is influenced by changing environmental conditions, including climatic conditions, which results in the changing composition of microorganisms interacting with this cereal. The group of these microorganisms includes not only endophytic fungi associated with the wheat endosphere, both pathogenic and symbiotic, but also those with yet unrecognized functions and consequences for wheat. This paper reviews the literature in the context of the general characteristics of endophytic fungi inhabiting the internal tissues of wheat. In addition, the importance of epigenetic regulation in wheat–fungus interactions is recognized and the current state of knowledge is demonstrated. The possibilities of using symbiotic endophytic fungi in modern agronomy and wheat cultivation are also proposed. The fact that the current understanding of fungal endophytes in wheat is based on a rather small set of experimental conditions, including wheat genotypes, plant organs, plant tissues, plant development stage, or environmental conditions, is recognized. In addition, most of the research to date has been based on culture-dependent methods that exclude biotrophic and slow-growing species and favor the detection of fast-growing fungi. Additionally, only a few reports of studies on the entire wheat microbiome using high-throughput sequencing techniques exist. Conducting comprehensive research on the mycobiome of the endosphere of wheat, mainly in the context of the possibility of using this knowledge to improve the methods of wheat management, mainly the productivity and health of this cereal, is needed.

NGS data reveals the phyllosphere microbiome of wheat plants infected by the fungal pathogen Zymoseptoria tritici

“…Wheat crops are exposed to several fungal plant pathogens, including Zymoseptoria tritici , the causal agent of Septoria tritici blotch (STB), a major disease in Western Europe (Fones and Gurr, 2015). In field conditions, wheat leaves host a multitude of other microorganisms — endophytic, epiphytic, pathogenic and saprophytic (Błaszczyk et al, 2021) — some of which interact directly or indirectly with Z. tritici (Kerdraon et al, 2019). Several taxa may also have antagonistic or synergistic activity while interacting with other taxa, and could be considered as potential biocontrol agents or facilitating agents that can limit or stimulate STB development (Chaudhry et al, 2020).…”

Seed dressing with M451 promotes seedling growth in wheat and reduces root phytopathogenic fungi without affecting endophytes

“…Indeed, many plant endophytes that belong to Aspergillus spp., Penicillium spp., and Staphylococcus spp. are sensitive to fungicide seed dressings and their loss disrupts mutualist endophyte-host interactions negatively affecting different plant characteristics ( Javed et al., 2019 ; Błaszczyk et al., 2021 ).…”

Editorial: Plant-fungal interactions

“…Some fungi interact positively or negatively with plant roots in the rhizosphere or aboveground parts of the plant (Barea et al, 2005 ). These fungi have different lifestyles viz., saprophytic, pathogenic, endophytic, or symbiotic, but the differences among different lifestyles are not always apparent (Błaszczyk et al, 2021 ). The beneficial plant-associated fungi assist their hosts by stimulating their growth, producing secondary metabolites, and improving their resistance to biotic and abiotic stresses (Verma et al, 2022 ).…”