| Summary: | <i>Tomato bushy stunt virus</i> (TBSV) and <i>Tomato mosaic virus</i> (ToMV) are important economic pathogens in tomato fields. <i>Rhizoglomus irregulare</i> is a species of arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungus that provides nutrients to host plants. To understand the effect of <i>R. irregulare</i> on the infection by TBSV/ToMV in tomato plants, in a completely randomized design, five treatments, including uninfected control plants without AM fungi (C), uninfected control plants with AM fungi (M) TBSV/ToMV-infected plants without AM fungi (V), TBSV/ToMV-infected plants before mycorrhiza (VM) inoculation, and inoculated plants with mycorrhiza before TBSV/ToMV infection (MV), were studied. Factors including viral RNA accumulation and expression of Pathogenesis Related proteins (PR) coding genes including <i>PR1</i>, <i>PR2</i>, and <i>PR3</i> in the young leaves were measured. For TBSV, a lower level of virus accumulation and a higher expression of PR genes in MV plants were observed compared to V and VM plants. In contrast, for ToMV, a higher level of virus accumulation and a lower expression of PR genes in MV plants were observed as compared to V and VM plants. These results indicated that mycorrhizal symbiosis reduces or increases the viral accumulation possibly via the regulation of PR genes in tomato plants.
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