Artificial elevation of glutathione contents in salicylic acid-deficient tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum cv. Xanthi NahG) reduces susceptibility to the powdery mildew pathogen Euoidium longipes

The effects of elevated glutathione levels on defence responses to powdery mildew (Euoidium longipes) were investigated in a salicylic acid-deficient tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum cv. Xanthi NahG) and wild-type cv. Xanthi plants, where salicylic acid (SA) contents are normal. Aqueous solutions of reduced glutathione (GSH) and its synthetic precursor R-2-oxothiazolidine-4-carboxylic acid (OTC) were injected into leaves of tobacco plants 3 h before powdery mildew inoculation. SA-deficient NahG tobacco was hyper-susceptible to E. longipes, as judged by significantly more severe powdery mildew symptoms and enhanced pathogen accumulation. Strikingly, elevation of GSH levels in SA-deficient NahG tobacco restored susceptibility to E. longipes to the extent seen in wild-type plants (i.e. enhanced basal resistance). However, expression of the SA-mediated pathogenesis-related gene (NtPR-1a) did not increase significantly in GSH or OTC-pretreated and powdery mildew-inoculated NahG tobacco, suggesting that the induction of this PR gene may not be directly involved in the defence responses induced by GSH. Our results demonstrate that artificial elevation of glutathione content can significantly reduce susceptibility to powdery mildew in SA-deficient tobacco

Identifying Molecular Markers Suitable For Frl Selection in Tomato Breeding

Modern plant breeding heavily relies on the use of molecular markers. In recent years, next generation sequencing (NGS) emerged as a powerful technology to discover DNA sequence polymorphisms and generate molecular markers very rapidly and cost effectively, accelerating the plant breeding programmes. A single dominant locus, Frl, in tomato provides resistance to the fungal pathogen Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. radicis-lycopersici (FORL), causative agent of Fusarium crown and root rot. In this study, we describe the generation of molecular markers associated with the Frl locus. An F2 mapping population between an FORL resistant and a susceptible cultivar was generated. NGS technology was then used to sequence the genomes of a susceptible and a resistant parent as well the genomes of bulked resistant and susceptible F2 lines. We zoomed into the Frl locus and mapped the locus to a 900 kb interval on chromosome 9. Polymorphic single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) within the interval were identified and markers co-segregating with the resistant phenotype were generated. Some of these markers were tested successfully with commercial tomato varieties indicating that they can be used for marker-assisted selection in large-scale breeding programmes

Defense Reactions of Infected Plants: Roles of Glutathione and Glutathione S-Transferase Enzymes

In recent years, the importance of the endogenous plant tripeptide glutathione (GSH) has been increasingly recognized in plant-pathogen interactions due to its contribution to various signaling and defense mechanisms. In this paper the recent developments in the research for possible roles of GSH in infected plants are summarized. GSH participates not only in antioxidative and detoxification reactions but also in redox regulation of the expression of protective genes in infected cells. Several lines of evidence suggest that glutathione S-transferase (GST) isoenzymes also have an important role in plant disease resistance, but their exact functions have remained elusive

The monoterpenoid (S)-carvone massively up-regulates several classes of glutathione S-transferase genes in tobacco leaf discs

The monoterpenoid (S)-carvone was shown earlier to induce glutathione S-transferase (GST) activity and to attenuate necrotic lesion formation in Tobacco mosaic virus (TMV) inoculated, hypersensitively reacting tobacco Xanthi-nc plants. To explore structure-activity relationships, three monoterpenes and five monoterpenoids were tested for their ability to induce increased GST activity in tobacco leaf discs. (S)-Carvone proved to be the most potent inducer. (S)-Carvone treatments markedly up-regulated the expression of several tobacco GST genes belonging to the phi, tau and theta classes, particularly in the case of tau class GSTs. Furthermore, TMV inoculation slightly induced the transcript abundance of the GSTT2 gene. The expression of three catalase (CAT) genes was also examined in (S)-carvone-treated tobacco leaf discs. The expression of CAT1 was not influenced by (S)-carvone treatments, whereas that of CAT2 was significantly repressed. (S)-Carvone very weakly induced the transcription of the CAT3 gene. The effect of the opposite enantiomer, (R)-carvone on the expression of GST and CAT genes was similar to that of (S)-carvone. Our results suggest that the antioxidative reactions catalyzed by tau and theta class GSTs contribute to the attenuation of necrotic disease symptoms in TMV-inoculated tobacco plants

Evidence for the involvment of an oxidative stress in the initiation of infection of pear by Erwinia amylovora

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