The assembly of bacterial communities in the rhizosphere is well‐documented and plays a crucial role in supporting plant performance. However, we have limited knowledge of how plant rhizosphere determines the assembly of protistan predators and whether the potential associations between protistan predators and bacterial communities shift due to rhizosphere selection. To address this, we examined bacterial and protistan taxa fr...

Summary SR protein‐specific kinases (SRPKs) uniquely with a spacer region are important splicing factors from yeast to human. However, little is known about their biological functions in filamentous fungi. Therefore, we characterized a SRPK called SRK1 in wheat scab fungus Fusarium graminearum . Our data showed that Srk1 is required for vegetative growth, sexual reproduction and plant infection, and plays critical roles in pre...

Summary Various surface signals are recognized by M agnaporthe oryzae to activate the P mk1 MAP kinase that is essential for appressorium formation and invasive growth. One of upstream sensors of the P mk1 pathway is the MoM sb2 signalling mucin. However, the activation of MoM sb2 and its relationship with other sensors is not clear. In this study, we showed that the cleavage and transmembrane domains are essential for MoM sb2...

Summary In eukaryotic cells, MADS ‐box genes are known to play major regulatory roles in various biological processes by combinatorial interactions with other transcription factors. In this study, we functionally characterized the FgMCM1 MADS ‐box gene in F usarium graminearum , the causal agent of wheat and barley head blight. Deletion of FgMCM1 resulted in the loss of perithecium production and phialide formation. The F gmcm...

Summary During adaptation to environments, bacteria employ two‐component signal transduction systems, which contain histidine kinases and response regulators, to sense and respond to exogenous and cellular stimuli in an accurate spatio‐temporal manner. Although the protein phosphorylation process between histidine kinase and response regulator has been well documented, the molecular mechanism fine‐tuning phosphorylation levels...

Summary Many Bacillus thuringiensis isolates have no demonstrated toxicity against insects. In this study, a novel holotype crystal protein gene cry7Ba1 was isolated from a ‘non‐insecticidal’ B. thuringiensis strain YBT‐978. The Cry7Ba1 protein showed high toxicity against Plutella xylostella larvae after the crystals were dissolved at pH 12.5, suggesting that the ‘non‐insecticidal’ properties of this protein were due to insol...