FIG 6.

Indispensability of flrA and fluG for insect pathogenicity and virulence-related cellular events of B. bassiana. (A, B) Time-survival trends of G. mellonella larvae after topical application (immersion) of a 10⁷ conidia/mL suspension for normal cuticle infection (NCI) and intrahemocoel injection of ~500 conidia per larva for cuticle-bypassing infection (CBI) and LT₅₀ estimates (d) from the trends. (C) Conidial adherence to locust hind wing cuticle assessed as percent ratios of postwash counts over prewash counts with respect to the WT standard. (D) Biomass levels and total ECEs and Pr1 activities (U/mL) assessed from 3-day-old CDB-BSA cultures and their supernatants, respectively. (E) Images (scale bar: 10 mm) for fungal outgrowths on the surfaces of insect cadavers 6 days after death from CBI. (F, G) Microscopic images (scale bar: 20 μm) for the status of hyphal bodies (HBs, arrowed) and host hemocytes (spherical or subspherical cells) in the hemolymph samples taken from surviving larvae 72-h and 120-h post-CBI and concentrations of hyphal bodies in the samples taken 48–120 h post-CBI, respectively. P < 0.05*, 0.01**, or 0.001*** in Tukey’s HSD tests. Error bars: SDs of the means from three independent replicates.