Data from: Slow and temperature-mediated pathogen adaptation to a non-specific fungicide in agricultural ecosystem

The spread of antimicrobial resistance and global change in air temperature represent two major phenomena that are exerting a disastrous impact on natural and social issues but investigation of the interaction between these phenomena in an evolutionary context is limited. In this study, a statistical genetic approach was used to investigate the evolution of antimicrobial resistance in agricultural ecosystem and its association with local air temperature. We found no resistance to mancozeb, a non-specific fungicide widely used in agriculture for more than half a century, in 215 Alternaria alternata isolates sampled from geographic locations along a climatic gradient and cropping system representing diverse ecotypes in China, consistent with low resistance risk in many non-specific fungicides. Genetic variance accounts for ~35% of phenotypic variation while genotype-environment interaction is negligible, suggesting that heritability plays a more important role in the evolution of resistance to mancozeb in plant pathogens than phenotypic plasticity. We also found that tolerance to mancozeb in agricultural ecosystem is under constraining selection and significantly associated with local air temperature, possibly resulting from a pleiotropic effect of tolerance with thermal and other ecological adaptations. The implication of these results for fungicide and other antimicrobial management in the context of global warming is discussed.

抗菌耐药性（antimicrobial resistance）的扩散与全球气温变化，是两类对自然与社会系统造成灾难性影响的重大现象，但目前针对二者在进化背景下的互作关系的研究仍较为匮乏。本研究采用统计遗传学方法（statistical genetic approach），探究了农业生态系统（agricultural ecosystem）中抗菌耐药性的演化规律及其与局地气温的关联。我们从中国境内覆盖气候梯度、种植制度多样的不同生态型的地理区域，采集了215株链格孢菌（Alternaria alternata）分离株，结果未检测到对代森锰锌（mancozeb）的耐药性——代森锰锌是一种已在农业中广泛使用超半个世纪的非选择性杀菌剂，这一结果与诸多非选择性杀菌剂的低耐药风险特征相符。遗传变异可解释约35%的表型变异（phenotypic variation），而基因型-环境互作（genotype-environment interaction）可忽略不计，这表明相较于表型可塑性（phenotypic plasticity），遗传力（heritability）在植物病原菌对代森锰锌的耐药性演化过程中发挥着更为关键的作用。我们还发现，农业生态系统中对代森锰锌的耐受性受到约束性选择（constraining selection）的调控，且与局地气温存在显著关联，这一现象可能源于耐药性与温度适应性及其他生态适应性之间的多效性效应（pleiotropic effect）。本文还讨论了上述研究结果在全球变暖（global warming）背景下，对杀菌剂及其他抗菌剂管理工作的启示。