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The genetic arms race between plant and Xanthomonas: lessons learned from TALE biology

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Abstract

The pathogenic bacterial genus Xanthomonas infects a wide variety of host plants and causes devastating diseases in many crops. Transcription activator-like effectors (TALEs) are important virulence factors secreted by Xanthomonas with the ability to directly bind to the promoters of target genes in plant hosts and activate their expression, which often facilitates the proliferation of pathogens. Understanding how plants cope with TALEs will provide mechanistic insights into crop breeding for Xanthomonas defense. Over the past 30 years, numerous studies have revealed the modes of action of TALEs in plant cells and plant defense strategies to overcome TALE attack. Based on these findings, new technologies were adopted for disease management to optimize crop production. In this article, we will review the most recent advances in the evolutionary arms race between plant resistance and TALEs from Xanthomonas, with a specific focus on TALE applications in the development of novel breeding strategies for durable and broad-spectrum resistance.

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by grants from the National Key R&D Program of China (2017YFD0100102), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31471175), Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province, China (2017A030313183), Science and Technology Program of Guangdong Province, China (2017A070702006, 2017B020201003), Modern Agricultural Industry Technology System of Guangdong Province, China (2019KJ105), Joint Research on High Quality Rice Varieties (Yuecainong [2019]73), Special Fund for Science and Technology Innovation Strategy (Construction of High-level Academy of Agricultural Sciences) (Foundation of President of Guangdong Academy of Agricultural Sciences in China, BZ201909).

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  1. Rice Research Institute, Guangdong Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of New Technology in Rice Breeding, Guangzhou, 510640, China

    Jiao Xue, Zhanhua Lu, Wei Liu, Shiguang Wang, Dongbai Lu, Xiaofei Wang & Xiuying He

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  1. Jiao Xue
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Xue, J., Lu, Z., Liu, W. et al. The genetic arms race between plant and Xanthomonas: lessons learned from TALE biology. Sci. China Life Sci. 64, 51–65 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11427-020-1699-4

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