Crop diseases are a critical limiting factor for agricultural production and a serious threat to food security in China. Disease resistance proteins are the most prominent family of immune receptors in plants. They sense the invasion of pathogenic bacteria and fungi and trigger the immune response and disease resistance process. The study of the molecular mechanisms of how disease-resistant proteins trigger plant immunity and lead to disease resistance has been a major scientific question in the plant field. Previously, a collaborative study revealed that the ZAR1 resistosome formed a Ca2+-permeable channel for triggering immune signals. However, it remains elusive whether the plant resistosome share a common mechanism for triggering plant immunity.
Molecular mechanism of the wheat Sr35 resistosome. A. The wheat protein Sr35 recognizes the Puccinia graminis f sp. tritici (Pgt) effector AvrSr35, resulting in the formation of Sr35 resistosome. B. Two-electrode voltage-clamp (TEVC) studies reveal that the Sr35 resistosome forms a Ca2+-permeable cation channel, which triggers Ca2+ signaling in plant immune response and disease resistance processes. C. Structure-inspired disease-resistant NLR design. (Image by IGDB)
A joint team led by Dr. CHAI Jijie (Tsinghua University/University of Cologne,) Paul Schulze-Lefert (Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research), and CHEN Yuhang (Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences), have recently elucidated the molecular mechanisms of Sr35 resistosome using multidisciplinary approaches of structural biology, plant genetics, and electrophysiology.
This study reveals for the first time that the wheat disease resistance receptor protein Sr35 can be recognized and activated by AvrSr35, the effector of wheat stem rust pathogen Puccinia graminis f sp. tritici (Pgt), and further oligomerized to form Sr35 resistosome. The collaborative research team found that the wheat Sr35 resistosome assembles into a Ca2+-permeable pentameric cation channel, similar to the ZAR1 resistosome. These studies suggest that the plant immune receptor channels share a conserved common mechanism to trigger the immune response and disease-resistant processes.
This work lays a foundation for the cross-species modification and utilization of CNL-like disease resistance proteins. This research has promising applications in agricultural production. The collaborative research team also precisely modified non-functional homologous proteins of disease susceptible crops to obtain disease resistance functions based on structural studies, providing a new strategy for designing disease-resistant crops.
This research work was published on Sep 26 in the issue of Nature under the title " A wheat resistosome defines common principles of immune receptor channels" (DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-05231-w).
The research was supported by the Strategic Priority Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the National Key R&D Program of China.
Contact:
Dr. CHEN Yuhang
Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
CAS
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