TY - JOUR TI - Blumenols as shoot markers of root symbiosis with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi AU - Wang, Ming AU - Schäfer, Martin AU - Li, Dapeng AU - Halitschke, Rayko AU - Dong, Chuanfu AU - McGale, Erica AU - Paetz, Christian AU - Song, Yuanyuan AU - Li, Suhua AU - Dong, Junfu AU - Heiling, Sven AU - Groten, Karin AU - Franken, Philipp AU - Bitterlich, Michael AU - Harrison, Maria J AU - Paszkowski, Uta AU - Baldwin, Ian T A2 - Weigel, Detlef A2 - Parniske, Martin VL - 7 PY - 2018 DA - 2018/08/28 SP - e37093 C1 - eLife 2018;7:e37093 DO - 10.7554/eLife.37093 UR - https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.37093 AB - High-through-put (HTP) screening for functional arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF)-associations is challenging because roots must be excavated and colonization evaluated by transcript analysis or microscopy. Here we show that specific leaf-metabolites provide broadly applicable accurate proxies of these associations, suitable for HTP-screens. With a combination of untargeted and targeted metabolomics, we show that shoot accumulations of hydroxy- and carboxyblumenol C-glucosides mirror root AMF-colonization in Nicotiana attenuata plants. Genetic/pharmacologic manipulations indicate that these AMF-indicative foliar blumenols are synthesized and transported from roots to shoots. These blumenol-derived foliar markers, found in many di- and monocotyledonous crop and model plants (Solanum lycopersicum, Solanum tuberosum, Hordeum vulgare, Triticum aestivum, Medicago truncatula and Brachypodium distachyon), are not restricted to particular plant-AMF interactions, and are shown to be applicable for field-based QTL mapping of AMF-related genes. KW - arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi KW - blumenol KW - colonization rate KW - high-throughput screening KW - Nicotiana attenuata KW - Rhizophagus irregularis JF - eLife SN - 2050-084X PB - eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd ER -