Competition Assays to Quantify the Effect of Biocontrol Yeasts against Plant Pathogenic Fungi on Fruits

Abstract

Yeasts such as Aureobasidium pullulans are unicellular fungi that occur in all environments and play important roles in biotechnology, medicine, food and beverage production, research, and agriculture. In the latter, yeasts are explored as biocontrol agents for the control of plant pathogenic fungi (e.g., Botrytis cinerea, Fusarium sp.); mainly on flowers and fruits. Eventually, such yeasts must be evaluated under field conditions, but such trials require a lot of time and resources and are often difficult to control. Experimental systems of intermediate complexity, between in vitro Petri dish assays and field trials, are thus required. For pre- and post-harvest applications, competition assays on fruits are reproducible, economical and thus widely used. Here, we present a general protocol for competition assays with fruits that can be adapted depending on the biocontrol yeast, plant pathogen, type of assay or fruit to be studied.