Interaction of Mr-AbaA with the promoter region of Mr-veA. (A) qRT-PCR analysis of the expression levels of velvet family genes in the WT strain and the ΔMr-abaA strain. (B) Yeast one-hybrid assay to test the interactions of Mr-AbaA with the Mr-veA promoter regions. Yeast cells were transformed with both the pGADT7 AD vector containing the sequence of Mr-AbaA and plasmid pAbAi containing the Mr-veA promoter regions and mutated Mr-veA promoter regions. Transformed yeast cells were grown on SD-Leu medium with 600 ng/ml AbA, showing the interaction between the protein and the promoter region. NC, negative control; abaA-pveA, interaction between Mr-AbaA and the Mr-veA promoter region; abaA-mpveA, interaction between Mr-AbaA and the mutated Mr-veA promoter region; AbA, aureobasidin A. Putative ARE binding motifs are in the promoter regions of Mr-veA and Mr-wetA. One thousand-base pair portions of the Mr-veA and Mr-wetA promoter regions were analyzed. (C) Relative transcript levels of Mr-veA in the WT cultures in three different developmental stages. **, P < 0.01, Tukey’s HSD tests. Error bars in panels A and C indicate standard deviations of the means from three independent replicates.