A group from Nagoya University and the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research has succeeded in identifying the genes required when a parasitic plant parasitizes a host plant.
Parasitic plants are plant species that absorb water and nutrients from other plants, parasitize many agricultural products as host plants, and cause enormous agricultural damage all over the world because their yields are significantly reduced.
In this research group, the state of cell adhesion when a parasitic plant connects to a host is similar to the phenomenon that occurs at the connection surface of artificial grafts of plants, especially grafts between distantly related plants (differentiological grafts). As a result of paying attention to the fact that they are, they have discovered a mechanism common to both.
So far, the group has found that interfamily grafts, which were normally thought to be impossible, are possible in tobacco genus plants, and genes β-1,4 that are thought to be involved in cell wall reconstruction at the graft junctions. -Identified glucanase.And this time, when we carried out grafting of different species with the model parasitic plant, Phtheirospermum chinensis, we found that it is possible to graft it of different species as well as plants of the genus Tobacco, and further, β-1,4, which is secreted at the time of grafting of plants of the genus Tobacco. It was found that XNUMX-glucanase is commonly upregulated during infestation and grafting of Phtheirospermum japonicum.From this, it was clarified that there is a common mechanism between the phenomenon of parasitism of parasitic plants and the phenomenon of wound healing when grafting is artificially performed.
It was also discovered that the formation of parasitism was suppressed by temporarily reducing the expression of β-1,4-glucanase in Phtheirospermum.With this discovery, if technological development that artificially inhibits the activity of β-1,4-glucanase progresses, it is thought that the infestation of parasitic plants on crops can be suppressed, which will help avoid food shortages predicted in the future. It is expected to become.
Paper information:[Communications Biology] Host-parasite tissue adhesion by a secreted type of β-1,4-glucanase in the parasitic plant Phtheirospermum japonicum
