{"id":3695,"date":"2024-06-03T08:01:00","date_gmt":"2024-06-03T07:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/?p=3695"},"modified":"2024-07-09T16:20:14","modified_gmt":"2024-07-09T15:20:14","slug":"frog-skin-bacteria-could-protect-fruit-from-damaging-fungus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/frog-skin-bacteria-could-protect-fruit-from-damaging-fungus\/","title":{"rendered":"Frog skin bacteria could protect fruit from damaging fungus"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Bacteria found on the skin of a tropical frog could offer growers a sustainable treatment against a costly disease that causes havoc in fruit and vegetable crops around the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Caused by a fungal pathogen called Botrytis cinerea, <\/em>grey mould disease infects over 250 plants including tomatoes, cucumbers, strawberries and peppers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As well as damaging leaves and flowers in the field, the disease causes particular damage during harvest, post-harvest and storage, leading to major losses across the supply chain. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While synthetic fungicides have typically been used to treat the mould, concerns over their safety and efficacy have lead to research into alternative, more sustainable, control methods.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In recent years scientists have identified a number of bacteria that prompt plants to fire up their own in-built defense systems against pathogens. However, while some bacteria are already being used on farms, concerns about b. cinerea\u2019s<\/em> growing resistance to them means researchers are looking to more unusual solutions \u2014 hop up, a tiny frog typically at home in Colombia\u2019s forests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natural defence systems<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Having previously found that a type of bacteria from the species Acinetobacter<\/em> can inhibit the growth of B. cinerea<\/em>, scientists in Mexico and Argentina decided to look at the impact of three Acinetobacter <\/em>bacteria found on the Fitzinger\u2019s robber frog (Craugastor fitzinger<\/em>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As well as investigating the bacteria\u2019s ability to inhibit growth and development of B. cinerea<\/em>, the researchers also wanted to look at their involvement in prompting plant\u2019s natural defense systems, enabling them to fend off grey mould naturally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In trials on thale cress (Arabidopsis thaliana<\/em>) and tomato (Solanum lycopersicum)<\/em>, the research team found two of the bacteria impacted the growth of the fungus significantly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was due to the bacteria prompting the plants to produce defence hormones including salicylic acid, jasmonic acid and ethylene.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile blueberries treated with the bacteria \u2014 after they had been infected with the fungus \u2014  saw a slowing in mould growth. In untreated trials, 95% of fruits developed the disease, while fruits treated with bacteria saw incidence drop by almost 70%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Writing in Frontiers in Plant Science<\/a>, the researchers said until now there had been little research into the use of bacteria from animals as a potential fungicide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c[However these bacteria] present an efficient and feasible method to prevent fruit diseases by inhibiting<\/p>\n\n\n\n

pathogen development and contributing to plant defense through immune system induction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBased on these findings, we propose that the bacteria from amphibian skin have the potential to serve as promising biological control agents against plant pathogens.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bacteria found on the skin of tropical frogs could offer growers a sustainable treatment against a costly disease that causes havoc in fruit and vegetable crops around the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3696,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[309,155,734,582,51],"other-categories":[218],"class_list":["post-3695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sustainable-pest-control","tag-crop-diseases","tag-crop-fungus","tag-frogs","tag-fungus","tag-sustainable-agriculture","other-categories-editors-pick"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3695"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3695\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3721,"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3695\/revisions\/3721"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3696"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3695"},{"taxonomy":"other-categories","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farmingfuturefood.com\/feb2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/other-categories?post=3695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}