Functional analysis of MaPom1 gene in Metarhizium acridum

Pests and diseases in agriculture have become a global problem, and the development of biological pesticides is of great significance to agricultural production. Insecticidal fungal pesticides have the advantages of not easily making the host resistant, environmentally friendly, and sustainable control. They have great application potential. However, due to their slow insecticidal efficiency, susceptibility to environmental impacts, high production costs, and unstable control effects, they are insufficient. Severely hinder its wide application. Therefore, strengthening the study of the molecular mechanism of entomopathogenic fungi in the process of spore production, stress resistance, infection and pathogenicity is of great significance to fully tap its biological control potential. In the early stage, our research group used the model insect pathogenic fungus Metarhizium acridum as the material to screen and obtained a batch of genes that may be related to the conidiation pattern of filamentous fungi. Among them, the dual-specific kinase Pom1 gene is up-regulated expression in the microcycle conidiation. Studies have reported that the dual-specific kinase Pom1 can phosphorylate tyrosine and serine/threonine in the substrate, and play an important regulatory role in cell division and polar growth. In order to explore the function of the kinase Pom1 in Metarhizium acridum, this study used knockout and recovery strategies to explore the role of Pom1 in the growth, sporulation, stress resistance, and pathogenic process of Metarhizium anisopliae. The mechanism by which genes participate in the regulation of conidiation has been initially explored.