ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Cell. Infect. Microbiol.
Sec. Antibiotic Resistance and New Antimicrobial drugs
Volume 15 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2025.1661799
This article is part of the Research TopicTargeting Major Human Fungal Pathogens: Novel Insights into Virulence and Antifungal TherapiesView all 8 articles
Key sugar transporters drive development and pathogenicity in Aspergillus flavus
Provisionally accepted
Raheela Yasin1,2
Sayed Usman Ali Shah1,3
Qijian Qin1Xiufang Gong1
Bin Wang1
Linqi Wang3
Cheng Jin3
Wenxia Fang3,4*- 1Institute of Biological Sciences and Technology, Guangxi Academy of Sciences, Nanning, China
- 2College of Life Science and Technology, Guangxi University, Nanning, China
- 3State Key Laboratory of Microbial Diversity and Innovative Utilization, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
- 4Guangxi Academy of Sciences, Nanning, China
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Aspergillus flavus is a ubiquitous filamentous fungus that poses significant threats as both a causative agent of invasive aspergillosis and a major source of crop contamination due to production of aflatoxin B1 (AFB1). Sugars are essential for fungal metabolism, cell wall biosynthesis, and virulence, yet sugar transporters (STPs) in A. flavus remain largely uncharacterized. In this study, we systematically investigated three putative STP genes (G4B84_001982, G4B84_005374, and G4B84_009351) by comprehensive functional characterization of gene deletion mutants. Growth assays revealed that G4B84_001982 and G4B84_005374 mediate uptake of diverse sugar substrates, while G4B84_009351 appeared to be non-essential under tested conditions. Heterologous expressions in the hexose transport-deficient Saccharomyces cerevisiae strain confirmed their sugar transporter activity. Phenotypic analysis revealed that the Δ1982 and Δ5374 mutants showed pleiotropic defects, including impaired growth, reduced sporulation, delayed germination, increased sensitivity to cell wall stressors, and completely abolished sclerotium formation. Pathogenicity assays demonstrated that the two mutants exhibited attenuated virulence in both plants (crop seeds) and animal (Galleria mellonella) infection model. Our findings highlight the essential of two STPs in A. flavus development, stress tolerance, and pathogenicity, offering insights into sugar-mediated pathogenicity in this economically and medically important fungus.
Keywords: Aspergillus flavus, Sugar transporters, Sugar metabolism, Cell Wall, pathogenicity
Received: 08 Jul 2025; Accepted: 20 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Yasin, Ali Shah, Qin, Gong, Wang, Wang, Jin and Fang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Wenxia Fang, Guangxi Academy of Sciences, Nanning, China
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