2023 RTP round - Fitness costs of fungicide resistance conferring mutations in a crop pathogen

Status: Closed

Applications open: 8/07/2022
Applications close: 18/08/2022

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About this scholarship
Description/Applicant information

Plant pathogenic fungi are one of the most important biotic constraints to crop production, causing global annual crop losses well in excess of the calorific needs of 500 million people1. Fungicides are one of the tools producers use to protect their crops from fungal pathogen attacks and to reduce crop losses. The use of fungicides in Australia and globally has increased considerably. This has been associated with increasing emergence of fungicide resistance in Australia2 and globally3. 
Fungicides exert selection pressure, and as such are likely to provide selection advantages for fugal pathogen strains that have evolved resistance to fungicides. With continued use of fungicides (hence continued selection for strains with a resistance to a fungicide), the selected strains may, over time, dominate the sensitive types in the pathogen population and render the fungicide ineffective at controlling the pathogen. The globally emerging resistances to fungicides therefore represent a growing threat to crop disease management, and hence global food security.
Fungicides with a demethylase inhibitor (DMI) mode of action are the most widely used fungicides in in agriculture4, and also one of the most affected fungicides. The DMIs are single-site acting fungicides targeting the Cyp51 enzyme, which is essential to the biosynthesis of a product necessary for fungal cell membrane, and hence for fungal growth5. Because the DMIs target a single site (enzyme), the fungus can evolve mutations to render the fungicide less effective. The types and mechanisms of fungicide resistance may be many and varied, but two of these include a mutation leading to modification of fungicide target site (e.g., a single amino acid substitution) and copy number variation in a gene encoding a fungicide’s target protein. Such cases were recently identified by our team in Pyrenophora teres f. teres, Ptt (the causal pathogen of net form net blotch in barley) for the demethylase inhibitor (DMI) fungicide. Existence of copy number variations in different isolates of a pathogen may affect some aspects of the life history traits and exert fitness costs/penalties on isolates carrying multiple copies of the fungicide target gene. In this project, the potential candidate will investigate pathogen fitness in isolates of Ptt that carry target site mutation, or mutation plus varying number of gene copies, along with wild type isolates. The work will involve, in vitro and in planta studies of growth, sporulation, infection efficiency, pathogenicity, virulence, latent period as well as competition with and without fungicide (selection pressure) under a variety of environmental conditions and host genetics background. Identification of significant fitness costs of resistance evolution and the conditions under which these occur can guide management strategies towards lessening impact of the global tide of fungicide resistance on crop production.
1Fisher et al., 2012. Nature 484:186-194. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature10947  
2Ireland et al., 2021. Fungicide Resistance Management in Australian Grain Crops. https://grdc.com.au/AFREN 
3Fisher et al., 2018. Science 6390:739-742. https://doi:10.1126/science.aap7999 
4Oliver RP and Hewitt HG. 2014. Fungicides in Crop Protection. 2nd Ed. www.cabi.org 
5Mair et al., 2020. Fungal Gen and Biol. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fgb.2020.103475 

An Internship opportunity may also be available with this project.

Student type

• Future Students

Faculty

• Faculty of Science & Engineering
  • Science courses
  • Engineering courses
  • Western Australian School of Mines (WASM)

Course type

• Higher Degree by Research

Citizenship

• Australian Citizen
• Australian Permanent Resident
• New Zealand Citizen
• Permanent Humanitarian Visa

Scholarship base

• Merit Based

Value

The annual scholarship package (stipend and tuition fees) is approx. $60,000 - $70,000 p.a.

 

Successful HDR applicants for admission will receive a 100% fee offset for up to 4 years, stipend scholarships, valued at $28,854 p.a. for up to a maximum of 3.5 years, are determined via a competitive selection process. Applicants will be notified of the scholarship outcome in November 2022. 

 

For detailed information, visit: Research Training Program (RTP) Scholarships | Curtin University, Perth, Australia.

Scholarship Details
Maximum number awarded

1

Eligible courses

All applicable HDR courses

Eligibility criteria

The potential HDR applicant will bring skills in plant pathology, molecular biology, experiences in handling fungal cultures, good organisational and time management skills, designing experiments and data analysis. 

Application process

If this project excites you, and your research skills and experience are a good fit for this specific project, you should contact the Project Lead (listed below in the enquires section) via the Expression of Interest (EOI) form.

Enrolment Requirements

Eligible to enrol in a Higher Degree by Research Course at Curtin University by March 2023

Enquiries

To enquire about this project opportunity that includes a scholarship application, contact the Project lead, Dr Ayalsew Zerihun via the EOI form above.

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