Phosphocholine cytidylyltransferase MoPct1 is crucial for vegetative growth, conidiation, and appressorium-mediated plant infection by Magnaporthe oryzae

• Published in: Frontiers in microbiology 2023-05, Vol.14, p.1136168-1136168
• Main Authors: Xu, Zhe, Tong, Qi, Lv, Wuyun, Xiao, Yu, Wang, Zhengyi
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: CDP-cho pathway; gene function; histone methylation; Magnaporthe oryzae; Microbiology; pathogenicity; phosphatidylcholine
• ISSN: 1664-302X; 1664-302X
• DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2023.1136168

Phosphatidylcholine (PC) plays crucial biological roles in eukaryotic cells. In , apart from phosphatidylethanolamine (PE) methylation pathway, PC is also synthesized via CDP-choline pathway. Phosphocholine cytidylyltransferase Pct1 is the rate-limiting enzyme to catalyze the conversion from phosphocholine to CDP-choline in this pathway. Here, we report the identification and functional characterization of an ortholog of the budding yeast in , named . Targeted gene deletion mutants of were impaired in vegetative growth, conidiation, appressorium turgor accumulation and cell wall integrity. Also, the mutants were severely compromised in appressorium-mediated penetration, infectious growth and pathogenicity. Western blot analysis revealed that cell autophagy was activated by the deletion of under nutrient-rich conditions. Moreover, we found several key genes in PE methylation pathway, such as , , and , were significantly up-regulated in the mutants, indicating that a pronounced compensation effect exists between the two PC biosynthesis pathways in . Interestingly, in the mutants, histone H3 was hypermethylated and expression levels of several methionine cycling-related genes were significantly up-regulated, suggesting that is involved in histone H3 methylation and methionine metabolism. Taken together, we conclude that the phosphocholine cytidylyltransferase coding gene plays important roles in vegetative growth, conidiation and appressorium-mediated plant infection by .