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Poster

Session: Session 1 Presenting Authors at Posters (Evens)

P-222 - Under Pressure: Unraveling the Penetration Power of the necrotrophic Fungus Botrytis

Tuesday, July 15, 2025
09:55 - 11:30  
Location: Confex Hall 3
Microbial infection strategies (pathogens & non-pathogens)

    Presenting Author(s)

  • TM

    Tobias Mueller

    RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau
    Kaiserslautern, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany

    • Author(s)

  • JB

    Jochem Bronkhorst

    Wageningen University & Research
    Wageningen, Gelderland, Netherlands

  • JM

    Jonas Müller

    RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau
    Kaiserslautern, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany

  • NS

    Nassim Safari

    RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau
    Kaiserslautern, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany

  • MH

    Matthias Hahn

    RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau
    Kaiserslautern, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany

  • JS

    Joris Sprakel

    Wageningen University and Research
    Wageningen, Gelderland, Netherlands

  • DS

    David Scheuring

    RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau
    Kaiserslautern, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany

The devastating pathogen Botrytis cinerea (Botrytis) has a broad host range and causes great socio-economic damage. During invasion, Botrytis rapidly kills plant cells, degrading their cell walls and subsequently feeding on their contents. To achieve this, the fungus secretes a cocktail of cell wall degrading enzymes, phytotoxic proteins, and metabolites. However, it is unclear to which extent Botrytis generates turgor pressure to breach plant barriers. In contrast to (hemi-) biotrophic pathogens, the infection structure of Botrytis does not display obvious structural specialization. Here, we use a combination of quantitative micromechanical imaging and CRISPR-Cas guided mutagenesis to reveal that Botrytis uses unexpectedly high invasive pressure for penetration, even without secretion of most toxic proteins. We found that the fungus establishes a unique, actin dependent penetration pattern which requires strong surface adhesion. Interference of force generation by blocking actin polymerization led to a significant decrease of infection success, suggesting an important contribution to virulence. Taken together, our results demonstrate that the necrotrophic fungus, despite lacking highly specialized appressoria, generates a high penetration power that is necessary for host colonization. Moreover, we were able to shed light on the underlying penetration mechanics which might be conserved in other pathogenic fungi and could help develop novel strategies for plant protection.