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MSc Exit Seminar – Alexandra Menna (Guttman/Desveaux labs)
September 17, 2015 @ 2:30 pm - 3:00 pm
MSc Exit Seminar
Thursday September 17th, 2:30 pm – Ramsay Wright Building, Rm. 432
Alexandra Menna (Guttman/Desveaux labs)
“Environmental Requirements Underlying Effector-Triggered Immunity in Arabidopsis thaliana“
Abstract
Pseudomonas syringae is a Gram-negative bacterium that infects multiple plant species by manipulating cellular processes via injection of type three secreted effectors (T3SEs) into host cells. Nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat (NLR) resistance (R) proteins recognize specific T3SEs and trigger a robust immune response, called effector-triggered immunity (ETI). ETI is often associated with localized programmed cell death (PCD), known as the hypersensitive response (HR), which limits pathogen proliferation. In this project, we examined the influence of elevated temperature on ETI. Elevated temperature differentially affects ETI outputs examined in this study – namely, HR and pathogen virulence suppression. We observed that elevated temperature conditions capable of suppressing HR had minimal influence on ETI-associated virulence suppression, thereby uncoupling these two ETI responses. We have identified ecotypes of Arabidopsis that show suppression of ETI-associated virulence suppression at elevated temperature, highlighting the natural variation that exists in coping with elevated temperature. These results not only reinforce the influence of abiotic factors on plant immunity, but also emphasize the importance of carefully documented environmental conditions in studies of plant immunity.
Ramsay Wright is a wheelchair accessible building.