The Arabidopsis defense response mutant esa1as a model to discover novel resistance traits against Fusarium diseases
Hemelrijck. W. V Wouters. P. F. W Brouwer. M Windelinckx. A Goderis. I. J. W. M Bolle. M. F. C. D Thomma. B. P. H. J Cammue. B. P. A Delaure. S. L
Plant Science ; 2006 [Vol.171] Pages:585-595
Abstract
The Arabidopsis thaliana mutant esa1 was previously shown to exhibit enhanced susceptibility to the necrotrophic fungal pathogens Alternaria brassicicola, Botrytis cinerea and Plectosphaerella cucumerina. In this work, we tried to elaborate on this susceptibility by investigating whether the esa1 phenotype can be extended to Fusarium species, a genus that includes several economically relevant pathogens. We show that the esa1 mutant exhibits increased susceptibility to several Fusarium species, including Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. matthiolae, F. solani, and F. culmorum. Furthermore, we show that the causal agent of the Panama disease on banana, F. oxysporum f. sp. cubense, a pathogen for which wild-type A. thaliana shows non-host resistance, causes enhanced lesion formation on esa1 as compared to wild-type plants, suggesting that esa1 is more sensitive to F. oxysporum f. sp. cubense. In addition, we were able to show that the A. thaliana wild-type resistance phenotype towards the latter pathogen can be partially restored by expression of the pathogenesis-related proteins PR1 or PR5 from tobacco in esa1, suggesting that PR1 and/or PR5 expression may be useful traits to obtain enhanced resistance to F. oxysporum f. sp. cubense in banana. As such, esa1 proves to be an ideal model system for research on the plant's defense response against fungal pathogens in general and Fusarium species in particular.
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