Abstract Detail

Physiology

KONG, FENG [1], Ramonell, Katrina [1].

Identification and Characterization of ATL12:A gene involved in chitin-elicitor-triggered immunity and salt and drought tolerance.

Plants are non-motile and face both pathogen attack and abiotic stress in nature. Pathogen attacks or abiotic stresses like cold temperature, drought and salt stress are common conditions that greatly affect plant metabolism and even change geographic distribution of species. In an agricultural setting, plant pathogens are responsible for significantly reducing crop yields and product quality in crop plants.Worldwide, an estimated 70 percent increase in global overall food production will be required by 2050 to feed an estimated world population of 9.1 billion people. For these reasons the need to develop novel strategies to increase plant resistance to both abiotic and biotic stressors without decreasing crop yield and quality becomes more urgent. Our previous studies have shown that Arabidopsis ATL12,from the Arabidopsis Toxicos en Levadura 2gene family, encodes a putative E3 ubiquitin ligase and is highly induced in response to fungal infection, drought and salt stresses. Our results suggest that loss of function mutants in ATL12are more susceptible to infection with the powdery mildew fungal pathogen when compared to Col-0 wild type while overexpression of ATL12significantly increased resistance to powdery mildew. Moreover, knock-out mutants of atl12also showed a significant decrease in their tolerance to drought and salt stress, compared to Col-0 wild type. Transient expression of a 35S::ATL12::GFP construct in tobacco leaves clearly showed the protein is localized to the plasma membrane. Additionally ^PATL12::GUS reporter activity showed that the protein localized to the seed, root, and stamen in transgenic Arabidopsis. Reverse Transcription-Quantitative Real-Time PCR data suggest thatATL12expression is highly induced by chitin, and affected by treatment with two plant major defense hormones, salicylic acid and jasmonic acid, indicating that ATL12 may be involved in cross-talk between SA-, JA- and chitin-induced defense signaling pathways.

1 - University of Alabama, Biological Sciences, 1325 Science and Engineering Complex (SEC), 300 Hackberry Lane, Tuscaloosa, AL, 35487-0344, USA

Keywords:
Resistance
Chitin
salt tolerance
Arabidopsis
drought.

Presentation Type: Oral Paper
Session: PHYS1, Physiology
Location: San Pedro 2/Starr Pass
Date: Monday, July 29th, 2019
Time: 10:30 AM
Number: PHYS1010
Abstract ID:1078
Candidate for Awards:Physiological Section Physiological Section Li-COR Prize,Physiological Section Best Paper Presentation