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A Volatile Relationship: Profiling an Inter-Kingdom Dialogue Between two Plant Pathogens, Ralstonia Solanacearum and Aspergillus Flavus

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Abstract

Microbes in the rhizosphere have a suite of extracellular compounds, both primary and secondary, that communicate with other organisms in their immediate environment. Here, we describe a two-way volatile interaction between two widespread and economically important soil-borne pathogens of peanut, Aspergillus flavus and Ralstonia solanacearum, a fungus and bacterium, respectively. In response to A. flavus volatiles, R. solanacearum reduced production of the major virulence factor extracellular polysaccharide (EPS). In parallel, A. flavus responded to R. solanacearum volatiles by reducing conidia production, both on plates and on peanut seeds and by increasing aflatoxin production on peanut. Volatile profiling of these organisms using solid-phase micro-extraction gas chromatography mass spectroscopy (SPME-GCMS) provided a first glimpse at the compounds that may drive these interactions.

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Acknowledgments

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under grant no. EFRI-1136903 to N.P.K. and an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship under grant no. DGE-1256259 to J.E.S. We thank Dr. Gabriel Peckham at Black Ivory Biotech for the 3. H7 cell lines, and James Starr of Texas A&M University for peanuts used in these experiments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Plant Pathology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 53706, Madison, WI, USA

    Joseph E. Spraker & Caitilyn Allen

  2. Department of Bacteriology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 53706, Madison, WI, USA

    Kelsea Jewell, Jacob Scherf & Nancy P. Keller

  3. Department of Plant Biology, Michigan State University, 48824, East Lansing, MI, USA

    Ludmila V. Roze

  4. Walloon Centre for Industrial Biology -Technology Unit, University of Liège Bd. du rectorat, 29-B 40, B-4000, Liège, Belgium

    Dora Ndagano

  5. Department of Horticulture, Michigan State University, 48824, East Lansing, MI, USA

    Randolph Beaudry

  6. Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition, Michigan State University, 48824, East Lansing, MI, USA

    John E. Linz

  7. Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 53706, Madison, WI, USA

    Nancy P. Keller

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  1. Joseph E. Spraker
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  2. Kelsea Jewell
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  3. Ludmila V. Roze
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  6. Randolph Beaudry
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  8. Caitilyn Allen
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  9. Nancy P. Keller
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Nancy P. Keller.

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Fig S1

R. solanacearum volatiles have variable affects on fungal conidiation a) Photos of representative conidiation of different Aspergilli in axenic culture b) Photos of representative conidiation of different Aspergilli in co-culture c) Key to layout of photo for panels a and b. (DOCX 11234 kb)

Fig S2

A. flavus produces less conidia in response to various bacteria a) Photos of representative differential conidiation of A. flavus in response to co-culture with various bacteria b) Key to layout of photo for panel a. c) Mean + SEM of conidial counts in response to co-culture with different bacteria. Asterisks indicate statistical significance according to one-way ANOVA followed by Tukey’s post-hoc test (p<0.0001, N=4). (DOCX 8381 kb)

Table S1

Total compiled data from SPME-GCMS experiments. Detectable quantities for each run shown, as well as their difference and average value. (DOCX 47 kb)

Table S2

Co-culture VOC analysis. Mass area data collected from two independent biological samples were averaged. Microbe specific fold changes for each volatile were calculated based on comparisons of averages with that of the co-culture reading. (DOCX 52 kb)

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Spraker, J.E., Jewell, K., Roze, L.V. et al. A Volatile Relationship: Profiling an Inter-Kingdom Dialogue Between two Plant Pathogens, Ralstonia Solanacearum and Aspergillus Flavus. J Chem Ecol 40, 502–513 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10886-014-0432-2

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