H2020Индивидуална стипендия2021–2023

Zuppressors · Identifying Zymoseptoria tritici effectors that suppress wheat immune responses

„Хоризонт 2020“ — Действия „Мария Склодовска-Кюри“

Период: 2021-04-01 → 2023-03-31
Финансиране от ЕС: 162 806 €
Участници: 1
Схема: MSCA-IF

Линиите свързват координатора с партньорите.

Накратко на български

Протеините на гъбичката Zymoseptoria tritici се анализират, за да се разбере как те потискат имунната система на пшеницата. Това помага за разработването на стратегии за намаляване на загубите от реколтата и подобряване на продоволствената сигурност.

Този кратък обзор е генериран от изкуствен интелект

Кратко обяснение, генерирано от езиков модел по текста на CORDIS. Оригиналът е по-долу.

Резултати накратко

Identifying Zymoseptoria tritici effectors that suppress wheat immune responses

Food security is a major concern to growing world populations and efforts are required to maximise the yield of crops. Plant pathogens result in significant annual losses, and so it is important to better understand these pathogens, and the mechanisms they use to infect plants, in order to develop new strategies for mitigating associated losses. One of the major fungal pathogens of wheat (particularly in Europe) is Zymoseptoria tritici, which is responsible for the necrotic lesion disease known as Septoria tritici blotch (STB). Despite its importance, very little is known about the molecular mechanisms involved in how the pathogen manipulates the host during infection. Before inducing necrotic lesions, Z. tritici undergoes an extended latent growth phase, and is able to evade the host’s immune system. However, we do not know how this fungus actively suppresses the host immune system. The goal of my Marie Curie Fellowship project was to help develop our understanding of the molecular processes that occur during the latent phase of Z. tritici’s growth in wheat by identifying small-secreted proteins that are involved in host-immune suppression (or targeting plant proteins involved in this process). The three primary objectives of my project were: • Objective 1: Identify effectors conserved among all Zymoseptoria species that are able to suppress BAK1 dependent immunity. • Objective 2: Identify effectors unique to Z. tritici, but conserved across all examined isolates of the fungus, and screen for ability to confer host-range specificity • Objective 3: Express and purify candidate BAK1-suppressing effectors and candidate host-range effectors for infiltration in wheat. To undertake this project, I used a number of different molecular and bioinformatics techniques and established multiple new collaboration partnerships. From these efforts, I have successfully identified a number of effectors that are involved in plant immune-suppression, and/or that putatively target plant proteins involved in defence signalling.

Текст от CORDIS, на английски · Данни: CORDIS, © Европейски съюз

Цел на проекта

I will use my MSCA-IF in the Stukenbrock Lab to dissect the molecular interactions between the fungal pathogen, Zymoseptoria tritici, and its host plant, wheat. Despite being the most devastating fungal wheat disease in Europe, little is known about the molecular mechanisms used by Z. tritici to cause disease. I propose to undertake a project that will use my expertise in molecular biology, combined with the Stukenbrock Lab's expertise in fungal genomics and evolution, to build a better understanding of how Z. tritici is able to evade host immune defences in order to grow, develop and, ultimately, induce disease symptoms. Plant pathogens use secreted proteins, described as effectors, to suppress host defences and/or alter host metabolism. However, few effectors from Z. tritici have been characterised. I aim to identify effectors that are used by Z. tritici to suppress wheat immune systems. To select effector candidates, I will use the Stukenbrock Lab's Zymoseptoria genomic resources to compare the variation in effector complements among Z. tritici and its closely related sister species. Z. tritici can infect wheat and not wild grass species. Inversely, Z. tritici's sister species infect wild grasses, but cannot infect wheat. Therefore, I hypothesise that effectors shared among all of these species are candidates as suppressors of conserved plant immune systems, whereas, effectors unique to Z. tritici, and conserved among all isolates of this fungus, are likely involved in host specialisation. I will screen the former set of effector candidates for their ability to suppress BAK1-dependent immune responses (an immune pathway conserved among a divergent range of plant species). I will knock-out the genes encoding the latter set of effectors, and will screen whether the virulence of the resulting mutants is reduced. Combined, these two approaches will help assign functions to more Z. tritici effectors and, thereby, develop new insights into this devastating disease.

Оригинален текст от CORDIS (на английски).

Участници

CHRISTIAN-ALBRECHTS-UNIVERSITAET ZU KIEL · KielКоординаторГермания