In: Endophytic Fungi ISBN: 978- 1 - 53610 - 341 - 0
Editor: Evelyn Hughes © 201 7 Nova Science Publishers, Inc.
Chapter 1
ENDOPHYTIC FUNGI: OCCURRENCE,
CLASSIFICATION, FUNCTION
AND NATURAL PRODUCTS
Afra Khiralla1,2, Rosella Spina1,2, Sakina Yagi^3 ,
Ietidal Mohamed^3 and Dominique Laurain-Mattar1,2,^
(^1) Université de Lorraine, SRSMC, Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy, France
(^2) CNRS, SRSMC, Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy, France
(^3) Botany Department, Faculty of Science,
University of Khartoum, Khartoum, Sudan
ABSTRACT
Introduction: Researches on endophytic fungi have proven they are a
promising source of biocontrol agents. These organisms are present in the
internal healthy plant tissues during a part or/all of their life cycle without
causing apparent harm to their hosts. They influence greatly the
physiological activities of their host plants. Fungal endophytes enhance
their host resistance against abiotic stress, disease, insects and
mammalian herbivores by producing a broad range of fungal metabolites.
Indeed several interesting metabolites isolated from endophytic fungi
belong to diverse chemical classes, including: alkaloids, steroids,
flavonoids, terpenoids, quinones and phenols. Since the isolation of
paclitaxel in 1993 from an endophytic fungus of Pacific Yew, fungal Corresponding author E-mail address: [email protected].