Evolutionary compromises in fungal fitness: hydrophobins can hinder the adverse dispersal of conidiospores and challenge their survival

• DOI: 10.1038/s41396-020-0709-0
• Publication Date: 2020-07-06T14:03:59Z
• Authors: Feng Cai; Renwei Gao; Zheng Zhao; Mingyue Ding; Siqi Jiang; Civan Yagtu; Hong Zhu; Jian Zhang; Thomas Ebner; Michael Mayrhofer...; Philipp Kainz; Komal Chenthamara; Günseli Bayram Ak...; Qirong Shen; Irina S Druzhinina
• Keywords: Hydrophobin; Fungal pathogen

Fungal evolutionary biology is impeded by the scarcity of fossils, irregular life cycles, immortality, and frequent asexual reproduction. Simple diminutive bodies fungi develop inside a substrate have exceptional metabolic ecological plasticity, which hinders species delimitation. However, unique fungal traits can shed light on forces that shape environmental adaptations these taxa. Higher filamentous disperse through aerial spores produce amphiphilic highly surface-active proteins called hydrophobins (HFBs), coat mediate interactions. We exploited library HFB-deficient mutants for two cryptic mycoparasitic saprotrophic from genus Trichoderma (Hypocreales) estimated development, reproductive potential, stress resistance. HFB4 HFB10 were found to be relevant fitness because they could impact spore-mediated dispersal processes control other traits. An analysis in silico revealed purifying selection all cases except T. harzianum, evolved under strong positive pressure. Interestingly, deletion hfb4 gene harzianum considerably increased its fitness-related Conversely, guizhouense led characteristic phenotypes associated with relatively low fitness. The net contribution was result tradeoffs between individual Our HFB-dependent has provided an snapshot selective pressures speciation process closely related species.