First Demonstration of Clinical Strains Causing Cross-Kingdom Infections from Humans to Plants.

Mycotoxins from the genus are widely known to cause economic losses in crops, as well as high mortalities rates among immunocompromised humans. However, to date, no correlation has been established for the ability of to cause cross-kingdom infection between plants and humans. The present investigation aims to fill this gap in the literature by examining cross-kingdom infection caused by strains isolated from non-immunocompromised or non-immunosuppressed humans, which were subsequently reinfected in plants and on human tissue. The findings document for the first time cross-kingdom infective events in species, thus enhancing our existing knowledge of how mycopathogens continue to thrive in different hosts.