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ARS Home » Southeast Area » Athens, Georgia » U.S. National Poultry Research Center » Toxicology & Mycotoxin Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #344062
Research Project: Eliminating Fusarium Mycotoxin Contamination of Corn by Targeting Fungal Mechanisms and Adaptations Conferring Fitness in Corn and Toxicology and Toxinology Studies of Mycotoxins

Location: Toxicology & Mycotoxin Research

Title: Ecological activity for mycotoxin beyond toxicity: screening mycotoxins for quorum inhibition

Author
item Bacon, Charles
item Hinton, Dorothy
item Mitchell, Trevor
item Blacutt, Alex

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: 7/17/2017
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: ABSTRACT: Biocontrol organisms are becoming essential features of several agricultural based crops, and bacterial endophytes are important components of several biocontrol systems. We are developing bacterial endophytes for use as biocontrol organisms for the corn fungal endophyte Fusarium verticillioides with the major objective of reducing its cadre of fumonisin mycotoxins. It is our hypotheses that factors by which plant endophyte communities are regulated involve host-produced compounds that modify behavior of endophytic microbes, often reducing growth rates and suppressing anti-pathogen behaviors reducing the desired biocontrol activity, including mycotoxin accumulation. Recent research has indicated a duel role for mycotoxins as organismal behavior-modifying compounds that include quorum-quenching or inhibiting compounds. Many such analytes are produced by endophytes that have interactive in protecting and regulating all aspects of endophytes. Testing these roles, we have designed studies used to test our hypothesis that involve an endophytic biocontrol bacterium, Bacillus mojavensis, as the test model endophyte of corn along with F. verticillioides, and its mycotoxins the fumonisin and fusaric acid. A bank of biosensor bacteria developed specifically for quorum sensing was used to screen mycotoxins of F. verticillioides, and other fusaria, along with bacterial metabolites for quorum sensing or quorum inhibiting (quenching) signaling activity. The results are presented along with discussion and a review on the uses and implications of quorum chemistry and its regulation as means of developing strategies for biocontrol, particularly as they relate to endophytic biocontrol organisms and mycotoxic endophytic pathogens such as the Fusarium species.