It is now established that many entomopathogenic fungi play additional roles such as endophytes in the nature. Beauveria bassiana and Metarhizium anisopliae have been reported as endophytes in some crops. According with Akuste et al (2013) Beauveria isolates can colonize roots, stems and leaves of P. vulgaris, but I need to know if there are any reports available on the potential of Metarhizium anisoplie or another specie as an endophyte in common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris).
Hi Yordanys,
As you may aware, Science has done a great progress in the last years in the field of microbiome in general. This allowed us to understand that a great numer of microbes is associated to plant organs (whether it be epiphytic, endophytic or rhizospheric). More specifically to endophytes, what is really interesting is that many plant diseases seem to be the result of multispecies microbial interactions rather than due to the monospecies infection. It could be one of the reason of why the disease severity in the field is often so severe than the laboratory infection.
As for your question, there are a number of reports on endophytic species of the common bean. The very recent one is the following.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25410007
Hi Jay,
Thank you for your answer. Also is important to note that there are many endophytic fungi naturally in plants, but there are different methods to introduce entomopathogenic fungi artificially on the plant organs such as leaves, roots and stems.
The soil-inhabiting insect-pathogenic fungus Metarhizium robertsii colonizes plant roots endophytically, and thus shows potential as a plant symbiont. M robertsii is not randomly distributed in soils but preferentially associates with the plant rhizosphere when applied in agricultural settings. Root surface and endophytic colonization of Phaseolus vulgaris has suggested that not only is M robertsii rhizosphere competent but displays a beneficial endophytic association with plant roots that results in the proliferation of root hairs
Please see these proceedings for Metarhizium and Beauveria as bean endophytes. Best regards, SSP http://www.entsoc.org/PDF/SWB/SWBProceedingsBookFinal.pdf
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