title: Interkingdom gene transfer may contribute to the evolution of phytopathogenicity in botrytis cinerea.
abstract: The ascomycete Botrytis cinerea is a phytopathogenic fungus infecting and causing significant yield losses in a number of crops. The genome of B. cinerea has been fully sequenced while the importance of horizontal gene transfer (HGT) to extend the host range in plant pathogenic fungi has been recently appreciated. However, recent data confirm that the B. cinerea fungus shares conserved virulence factors with other fungal plant pathogens with narrow host range. Therefore, interkingdom HGT may contribute to the evolution of phytopathogenicity in B. cinerea. In this study, a stringent genome comparison pipeline was used to identify potential genes that have been obtained by B. cinerea but not by other fungi through interkingdom HGT. This search led to the identification of four genes: a UDP-glucosyltransferase (UGT), a lipoprotein and two alpha/beta hydrolase fold proteins. Phylogenetic analysis of the four genes suggests that B. cinerea acquired UGT from plants and the other 3 genes from bacteria. Based on the known gene functions and literature searching, a correlation between gene acquision and the evolution of pathogenicity in B. cinerea can be postulated.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Rice Biology and Key Laboratory of Molecular Biology of Crop Pathogens and Insects, Ministry of Agriculture, Institute of Biotechnology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310029, China.
authors.forename: Bo
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.forename: Qing
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.forename: Guanlin
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Xie
authors.forename: Guoqing
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Xiaowei
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Yanli
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Gunchang
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.forename: Bin
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Gulei
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Jin