Trade-Offs in Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Symbiosis: Disease Resistance, Growth Responses and Perspectives for Crop Breeding

Abstract

Abstract:There is an increasing need to develop high-yielding, disease-resistant crops and reduce fertilizer usage. Combining disease resistance with efficient nutrient assimilation through improved associations with symbiotic microorganisms would help to address this. Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) form symbiotic relationships with most terrestrial plants, resulting in nutritional benefits and the enhancement of stress tolerance and disease resistance. Despite these advantages, arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) interactions are not normally directly considered in plant breeding. Much of our understanding of the mechanisms of AM symbiosis comes from model plants, which typically exhibit positive growth responses. However, applying this knowledge to crops has not been straightforward. In many crop plants, phosphate uptake and growth responses in AM-colonized plants are variable, with AM plants exhibiting sometimes zero or negative growth responses and lower levels of phosphate acquisition. Host plants must also balance the ability to host AMF with the ability to resist pathogens. Advances in understanding the plant immune system have revealed similarities between pathogen infection and AM colonization that may lead to trade-offs between symbiosis and disease resistance. This review considers the potential trade-offs between AM colonization, agronomic traits and disease resistance and highlights the need for translational research to apply fundamental knowledge to crop improvement.

Arbuscular Mycorrhiza Changes the Impact of Potato Virus Y on Growth and Stress Tolerance of Solanum tuberosum L. in vitro

“…We noticed that healthy plantlets colonized with R. irregularis displayed growth parameters similar to the control, with the only significant differences found in the higher root biomass (but not length) and higher chlorophyll content upon mycorrhization. Beneficial effect of AMF on root biomass production was already described for potato (Davies et al, 2005;Thiem et al, 2014) as well as for the other plant species (Saia et al, 2015;Chen M. et al, 2017;Jacott et al, 2017;Shao et al, 2018). We cannot exclude that enhanced biomass (but not the length) of root system could be associated with some structural changes that are known to be induced by AMF (e.g., enlargement of root cortex due to an extra cell layer development for accommodation of fungal structures) (Dreyer et al, 2014).…”

Effect of Indigenous and Introduced Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi on Growth and Phytochemical Content of Vegetatively Propagated Prunus africana (Hook. f.) Kalkman Provenances

“…These soil microorganisms help host plants to absorb mineral nutrients such like phosphorus (P), nitrogen (N), sulphur (S), potassium (K), calcium (Ca), iron (Fe), copper (Cu), and zinc (Zn); in return they benefit from the host plants by acquiring organic carbon in form of glucose and lipid [19,20]. In addition to direct nutrient benefits, AMF have been reported to offer ecosystem services, including resistance to diseases like root infections caused by pathogenic fungi [21,22], increased tolerance to drought [23] and improving the soil structure with the aggregate formation [24][25][26]. These benefits contribute to the growth and adaptation of plants in diverse environmental conditions.…”

Respuesta agronómica de Phaseolus vulgaris a la biofertilización en campo

“…En cuanto a los hongos formadores de micorriza arbuscular (HMA) se refiere, Labrador (2015) y León-Aroca et al (2017) destacan su capacidad por mantener una eficiente absorción de agua y nutrimentos, favorecer la captación de elementos primarios [especialmente fósforo] (Abd-Alla et al, 2014;Yadav et al, 2018) y otros beneficios no nutricionales imprescindibles para la supervivencia de las plantas (Halder et al, 2015;Delavaux et al, 2017) sin dejar de lado su contribución en la supresión de plagas y enfermedades (Vázquez, 2015;Jacott et al, 2017).…”