A new fungal endophyte, Scolecobasidium humicola, promotes tomato growth under organic nitrogen conditions.
basic_science · Level V
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- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 24223848.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0078746 and PMC identifier PMC3815298.
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Abstract
A new fungal endophyte, Scolecobasidium humicola, was identified as a common dark septate endophytic fungal (DSE) species under both natural and agricultural conditions. This fungus was found to grow endophylically in the roots of tomato seedlings. Light microscopy of cross-sections of colonized tomato roots showed that the intercellular, pigmented hyphae of the fungus were mostly limited to the epidermal layer and formed outer mantle-like structures. Two isolates of S. humicola, H2-2 and F1-3, have shown the ability to increase plant biomass with an organic nitrogen source. This finding is the first report of S. humicola as an endophyte and could help to improve plant growth with organic nitrogen sources.