Abstract
The genus Metarhizium and Pochonia chlamydosporia comprise a monophyletic clade of highly abundant globally distributed fungi that can transition between long-term beneficial associations with plants to transitory pathogenic associations with frequently encountered protozoans, nematodes or insects. Some very common ‘specialist generalist’ species are adapted to particular soil and plant ecologies, but can overpower a wide spectrum of insects with numerous enzymes and toxins that result from extensive gene duplications made possible by loss of meiosis and associated genome defence mechanisms. These species use parasexuality instead of sex to combine beneficial mutations from separate clonal individuals into one genome (Vicar of Bray dynamics). More weakly endophytic species which kill a narrow range of insects retain sexuality to facilitate host–pathogen coevolution (Red Queen dynamics). Metarhizium species can fit into numerous environments because they are very flexible at the genetic, physiological and ecological levels, providing tractable models to address how new mechanisms for econutritional heterogeneity, host switching and virulence are acquired and relate to diverse sexual life histories and speciation. Many new molecules and functions have been discovered that underpin Metarhizium associations, and have furthered our understanding of the crucial ecology of these fungi in multiple habitats.
Highlights
The genus Metarhizium and Pochonia chlamydosporia comprise a monophyletic clade of highly abundant globally distributed fungi that can transition between long-term beneficial associations with plants to transitory pathogenic associations with frequently encountered protozoans, nematodes or insects
The Metarhizium genus represents a continuum of species and strains with respect to divergence time, from recently diverged populations that are spatially restricted within continents to species that diverged more than 150 million years ago (Ma)
We principally focus on how recent studies on the genus Metarhizium have made these fungi model systems for addressing questions of wide biological significance, such as how new diseases and lifestyles originate. These studies have disentangled common themes in fungal biology from specific components involved in symbiosis and pathology, allowed broad host range pathogens to be studied in the context of narrow host range pathogens, addressed the basic question of how sexuality influences and is influenced by host specificity and habitat preference, and provided insights into the consequences of genomic changes that have accumulated during the evolutionary history of Metarhizium
Summary
‘The vivacious vicar living under King Henry VIII, King Edward VI, Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth, was first a Papist, a Protestant, a Papist, a Protestant again. We principally focus on how recent studies on the genus Metarhizium have made these fungi model systems for addressing questions of wide biological significance, such as how new diseases and lifestyles originate These studies have disentangled common themes in fungal biology from specific components involved in symbiosis and pathology, allowed broad host range pathogens to be studied in the context of narrow host range pathogens, addressed the basic question of how sexuality influences and is influenced by host specificity and habitat preference, and provided insights into the consequences of genomic changes that have accumulated during the evolutionary history of Metarhizium. The prolific production of enzymes and SMs by Metarhizium species is linked to their broad lifestyle options, and an extremely flexible metabolism that enables them to live in various environmental conditions, with sparse nutrients [26], and in the presence of compounds lethal to other microbes [21]
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