Abstract
Main conclusion
A putative powdery mildew effector can elicit defense responses including reactive oxygen species and callose accumulations in model plants Nicotiana benthamiana and Arabidopsis thaliana and host plant Hevea brasiliensis.
Abstract
Powdery mildew fungi cause severe diseases in many agricultural plants, such as the mildew fungus Erysiphe quercicola infecting the rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis), causing latex yield losses. However, effectors of E. quercicola were rarely functionally characterized. In this study, we identified a highly specific candidate-secreted effector protein, EqCSEP04187, from E. quercicola. This putative effector is expressed at the late stage but not the early stage during infection. The constitutive expression of EqCSEP04187 in model plants Nicotiana benthamiana and Arabidopsis thaliana elicited defense responses, as did transient expression of EqCSEP04187 in protoplasts of H. brasiliensis. Introducing EqCSEP04187 into another H. brasiliensis-associated fungal pathogen, Colletotrichum gloeosporioides, inhibited H. brasiliensis infection, and infection by E. quercicola was decreased in the A. thaliana eds1 mutant expressing EqCSEP04187. Further analysis suggests that these reductions in infection were the consequences of EqCSEP04187 eliciting defense responses. Our study suggests that this putative effector has elicitor activity that can improve plant resistance.
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Data availability statement
The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
Abbreviations
- CSEPs:
-
Candidate secreted effector proteins
- ROS:
-
Reactive oxygen species
- SP:
-
Signal peptide
- PRR:
-
Pattern recognition receptors
- PAMPs:
-
Pathogen-associated molecular patterns
- DAMPs:
-
Damage-associated molecular patterns
- NLRs:
-
Intracellular nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat receptors
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Acknowledgements
We thank Prof. Daolong Dou (Nanjing agricultural university) for providing the related carrier materials and technical for Agrobacterium-mediated transient expression in N.benthamiana experiment. Meanwhile, we would like to thank Editage (www.editage.com) for English language editing. This work was supported by grants from the Finance Science and Technology Project of Hainan Province (No. YSPTZX202018), National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 31960518), Hainan Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 320RC498) and National Key R&D Program of China (No. 2018YFD0201105).
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Li, X., Liu, M., Liu, Y. et al. A putative effector of the rubber-tree powdery mildew fungus has elicitor activity that can trigger plant immunity. Planta 255, 33 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00425-021-03818-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00425-021-03818-7