Studies on global transcriptional regulator EBR1 and genome-wide gene expression in the fungal plant pathogen Fusarium graminearum

Abstract of PhD thesis

Fusarium graminearum is a destructive plant pathogen that causes Fusarium head blight (FHB) on many crops, such as wheat, barley, rye and oat. In the first part of this thesis, we studied a transcription factor EBR1 that is required for radial growth and virulence in F. graminearum. Mutant ebr1 shows reduced apical dominance of the hyphal tip and loses its ability to penetrate the rachis of the spikelets. Subcellular localization analysis showed that EBR1 protein is exclusively localized in the nucleus of both conidia and hyphae. In the second part of thesis, by using RNA-Seq data, we revised 655 incorrectly predicted gene models and identified 231 genes with two or more alternative splice variants in F. graminearum. Furthermore, we analyzed the genome-wide gene expression pattern and found that genes locate in non-conserved regions of chromosomes showed relatively lower expression level. We further provided evidence showing that the non-conserved regions are full of gene relocations in F. graminearum.