FIG 1.

Deletion of laeA affects both morphological and physiological characteristics of Penicillium sp. MB strains (a) Colony aspect of Penicillium sp. MB strains grown on different media for 5 days at 25°C. GMM = glucose minimal medium, YES = yeast extract medium, CYA = Czapek Yeast Autolysate Agar, PDA = potato dextrose agar, CCA = cheese curd agar. Top and bottom views of the agar plates are shown in the top and bottom panels, respectively. (b) Spore counts for each strain over four days growth on GMM agar medium. The number of spores were assessed per standard area that was sampled by plugging the fungal colony using the shaft-attaching end of a p5000 pipette tip. (c) Percentage of germinated spores over 13 hours growth in GMM broth. Counting of germinated spores started 3 hours post-inoculation. There were no germinated spores between hours 3 to 6. In the bar graphs, the error bars represent one standard error of the mean and each dot represents a biological replicate (n = 3). One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was performed for each day for the sporulation data and each hour for the germination data. Dunnett’s multiple comparison test was used and compared to the MB_WT strain. (****) indicates P < 0.0001, (***) indicates P < 0.001, (**) indicates P < 0.01, (*) indicates P < 0.05, and no asterisk indicates not significant. For exact P-values for each treatment, see Data Set S1.