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A novel F‐box protein involved in sexual development and pathogenesis in Gibberella zeae
Author(s) -
Han YouKyoung,
Kim MyoungDong,
Lee SeungHo,
Yun SungHwan,
Lee YinWon
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
molecular microbiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.857
H-Index - 247
eISSN - 1365-2958
pISSN - 0950-382X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2958.2006.05557.x
Subject(s) - biology , gibberella zeae , f box protein , skp1 , mutant , virulence , genetics , saccharomyces cerevisiae , gene , fungal protein , hypothetical protein , ubiquitin ligase , ubiquitin , fusarium
Summary Gibberella zeae is an ascomyceteous fungus that causes serious diseases in cereal crops. Severe epidemics require strains that are virulent and that can reproduce sexually. We characterized an insertional mutant (designated ZH436) with a pleiotropic defect in both traits, and identified a novel F‐box protein gene encoding FBP1 ( F ‐ b ox p rotein 1 ) that is similar to fungal F‐box proteins including Saccharomyces cerevisiae Grr1, a well‐characterized component of the Skp1‐Cullin‐F‐box protein (SCF Grr1 ) E3 ligase complex required for protein degradation. FBP1 also can bind both S. cerevisiae Skp1 protein, the other component of the SCF Grr1 complex, and its G. zeae sequence homologue SKP1. Two putative protein interacting domains in FBP1 are essential for in vivo function. FBP1 and ScGRR1 are not so interchangeable between S. cerevisiae and G. zeae , but FBP1 can partially complement several defects of a yeast grr1 deletion mutant. Functional analyses confirmed that FBP1 is required for several phenotypes including both sexual development and virulence in G. zeae ; the phenotype of Δ FBP1 strains is different from those of null mutants for F‐box proteins in other filamentous fungi as well as from S. cerevisiae grr1 Δ strains. Thus, FBP1 is a versatile F‐box protein that presumably participates in the formation of the SCF FBP1 complex that probably controls the ubiquitin‐mediated degradation of proteins involved in sexual reproduction and virulence important for disease development by G. zeae .