Jiangsu Key Laboratory for the Research and Utilization of Plant Resources, The Jiangsu Provincial Platform for Conservation and Utilization of Agricultural Germplasm, Institute of Botany, Jiangsu Province and Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China.
Environ Microbiol. 2020 Apr;22(4):1421-1434. doi: 10.1111/1462-2920.14958. Epub 2020 Mar 2.
Lycoris radiata is a main source of Amaryllidaceae alkaloids; however, the low content of these alkaloids in planta remains a limit to their pharmaceutical development and utilization. The accumulation of secondary metabolites can be enhanced in plants inoculated with fungal endophytes. In this study, we analysed the diversity of culturable fungal endophytes in different organs of L. radiata. Then, by analysing the correlation between the detectable rate of each fungal species and the content of each tested alkaloid, we proposed several fungal candidates implicated in the increase of alkaloid accumulation. This was verified by inoculating these candidates to L. radiata plants. Based on the results of two independent experiments conducted in May 2018 and October 2019, the individual inoculation of nine fungal endophytes significantly increased the total content of the tested alkaloids in the entire L. radiata plants. This is the first study in L. radiata to show that fungal endophytes are able to improve the accumulation of various alkaloids. Therefore, our results provide insights into a better understanding of interactions between plants and fungal endophytes and suggest an effective strategy for enhancing the alkaloid content in the cultivation of L. radiata.
石蒜是石蒜科生物碱的主要来源；然而，这些生物碱在植物体内的含量低仍然限制了它们的药物开发和利用。在植物中接种真菌内生菌可以增强次生代谢物的积累。在本研究中，我们分析了不同器官中可培养的石蒜内生真菌的多样性。然后，通过分析每种真菌物种的检出率与每种测试生物碱含量之间的相关性，我们提出了几种与生物碱积累增加有关的真菌候选物。通过将这些候选物接种到石蒜植物上进行验证。基于 2018 年 5 月和 2019 年 10 月进行的两项独立实验的结果，单独接种 9 种真菌内生菌可显著提高整个石蒜植物中测试生物碱的总含量。这是首次在石蒜中表明真菌内生菌能够提高各种生物碱的积累。因此，我们的研究结果为深入了解植物与真菌内生菌之间的相互作用提供了新的见解，并为提高石蒜栽培中生物碱含量提供了一种有效的策略。
