Interactions between water activity and temperature on the Aspergillus flavus transcriptome and aflatoxin B1 production

- Temperature (30/37 °C) and water stress (0.99/0.91 aw) affected aflatoxin B1 on maize.
- RNAseq showed significant impacts of environmental factors on gene categories.
- Temperature/water stress changed differential expression of genes.
- Secondary metabolite gene clusters were differentially expressed by the imposed stress.
- This RNAseq study helps to identify functional gene groups involved in stress tolerance and toxin production.

Effects of Aspergillus flavus colonization of maize kernels under different water activities (aw; 0.99 and 0.91) and temperatures (30, 37 °C) on (a) aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) production and (b) the transcriptome using RNAseq were examined. There was no significant difference (p = 0.05) in AFB1 production at 30 and 37 °C and 0.99 aw. However, there was a significant (p = 0.05) increase in AFB1 at 0.91 aw at 37 °C when compared with 30 °C/0.99 aw. Environmental stress effects using gene ontology enrichment analysis of the RNA-seq results for increasing temperature at 0.99 and 0.91 aw showed differential expression of 2224 and 481 genes, respectively. With decreasing water availability, 4307 were affected at 30 °C and 702 genes at 37 °C. Increasing temperature from 30 to 37 °C at both aw levels resulted in 12 biological processes being upregulated and 9 significantly downregulated. Decreasing aw at both temperatures resulted in 22 biological processes significantly upregulated and 25 downregulated. The interacting environmental factors influenced functioning of the secondary metabolite gene clusters for aflatoxins and cyclopiazonic acid (CPA). An elevated number of genes were co-regulated by both aw and temperature. An interaction effect for 4 of the 25 AFB1 genes, including regulatory and transcription activators occurred. For CPA, all 5 biosynthetic genes were affected by aw stress, regardless of temperature. The molecular regulation of A. flavus in maize is discussed.