De Novo Production of Metabolites by Fungal Co-culture of Trichophyton rubrum and Bionectria ochroleuca

Abstract

The co-cultivation of fungi has recently been described as a promising strategy to induce the production of novel metabolites through possible gene activation. A large screening of fungal co-cultures in solid media has identified an unusual long-distance growth inhibition between Trichophyton rubrum and Bionectria ochroleuca. To study metabolite induction in this particular fungal interaction, differential LC-MS-based metabolomics was performed on pure strain cultures and on their co-cultures. The comparison of the resulting fingerprints highlighted five de novo induced compounds, which were purified using software-oriented semipreparative HPLC-MS. One metabolite was successfully identified as 4″-hydroxysulfoxy-2,2″-dimethylthielavin P (a substituted trimer of 3,5-dimethylorsellinic acid). The nonsulfated form, as well as three other related compounds, were found in the pure strain culture of B. ochroleuca.

Co-culturing of Fungal Strains Against Botrytis cinerea as a Model for the Induction of Chemical Diversity and Therapeutic Agents

“…Analytical methods have permitted to detect changes in the metabolite profiles that vary depending on the interacting fungi (Peiris et al, 2008; Rodrıguez-Estrada et al, 2011). Different co-culturing techniques have been developed for this purpose including liquid and solid media, but all approaches consist on culturing two or more microorganisms in a single confined environment to facilitate interactions and induce further chemical diversity (Bertrand et al, 2013). Some examples of compounds derived from these interactions include long-distance growth inhibitors reported between Trichophyton rubrum and Bionectria ochroleuca (Bertrand et al, 2013), the production of acremostatins A–C, by Acremonium sp.…”

Induction of Diverse Bioactive Secondary Metabolites from the Mangrove Endophytic Fungus Trichoderma sp. (Strain 307) by Co-Cultivation with Acinetobacter johnsonii (Strain B2)

“…Consequently, microorganism co-culture, which is the cultivation of two or more microorganisms in one culture vessel, and a potent way to activate the silent gene clusters and enhance chemical diversity for drug discovery, has aroused great concern in natural product research [8]. A variety of studies have explored the induction of fungal metabolites in fungal and bacterial co-cultures [9,10,11,12], as well as in fungal co-cultures [13,14,15,16]. …”

Exploring the Chemodiversity and Biological Activities of the Secondary Metabolites from the Marine Fungus Neosartorya pseudofischeri

“…These marine fungi are an important source of structurally unique and biologically active natural products. Recent studies revealed that the cryptic biosynthetic pathways of fungi can be activated and the chemical diversity of their metabolites can be maximized by alternating their cultivation parameters systematically, such as the components of the media [1,2], co-culture [3,4], feeding precursors [5,6] and the addition of enzyme inhibitors [7,8]. For example, marine fungus Chondrostereum sp., which was isolated from soft coral Sarcophyton tortuosum , grows in different culture media and can produce various novel bioactive hirsutane-type sesquiterpenoids [9,10,11,12].…”