Figure 2.

Indispensability of dim5 for pathogenicity and virulence. (a) Time-survival percentages of G. mellonella larvae after topical application (immersion) of a 10⁷ conidia/ml suspension for normal cuticle infection (NCI) or intrahaemocoel injection of ~500 conidia per larva for cuticle-bypassing infection (CBI) and LT₅₀ estimates made from the resultant time-mortality trends. Note that the Δdim5 mutant (DM) caused no mortality at all via NCI and showed a great delay of lethal action via CBI in comparison to two control (WT and CM) strains. (b) Images (scale: 10 mm) of fungal outgrowths on cadavers 6 days after their death from CBI. (c–e) Biomass levels of 3-day-old CDB-BSA cultures grown at 25°C and total activities of extracellular enzymes (ECEs) and Pr1 proteases quantified from the supernatants (extracellular or secreted) and protein extracts (intracellular or synthesized) of the cultures, respectively. *P< 0.01 in Tukey’s HSD tests. Error bars: SDs of the means from three independent replicates