Fungal(-like) biocontrol organisms in tomato disease control

The worldwide important crop tomato is under attack by various pathogens, for which management is still primarily reliant on fungicides despite the increasing concerns and constraints on their use. Other approaches are being investigated, including the use of biocontrol organisms to manage tomato diseases. In this review we will discuss and compare the interaction of the major biocontrol fungi (BCF) with tomato, including the endophytic arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi and Piriformospora indica, the free-living opportunistic symbionts Trichoderma spp. and non-pathogenic Fusarium oxysporum, as well as the fungi-like oomycete Pythium oligandrum. We will cover recent advances that have been made in unraveling biocontrol modes of action against the most important tomato pathogens, encompassing direct effects of the BCF on pathogens and their indirect effects through the plant, with a main focus on induced systemic resistance. It is an exciting era for the study of biocontrol tripartite interactions, with the emergence of next-generation sequencing tools and the higher pace at which new genomes are being sequenced nowadays, as was recently also achieved for tomato. In addition, plant pathology and biocontrol research domains are increasingly reaching out to each other, because of the parallels that we are only beginning to discover between the interactions of beneficial and detrimental micro-organisms with a plant. Considering the enormous technological possibilities at hand today, this seems a timely opportunity to review the most recent advances in this field and to anticipate to what is ahead of us, discussing breakthroughs that are to be expected in our understanding of biocontrol interactions and remaining hurdles on the way to reach them.status: publishe