Annual review of phytopathology最新文献

Public-private partnerships (PPPs) can be an effective and advantageous way to accomplish extension and outreach objectives in plant pathology. The greatest opportunities for extension-focused PPPs may be in response to large-scale or emerging disease management concerns or in addressing complex issues that impact agriculture, such as climate change, digital technology, and public perception of science. The most fertile ground for forming PPPs is where the needs and strengths of the public and private sectors are complementary. Developing PPPs depends as much on professional relationships as on technical skills or contracts. Defining and making room for the success of all partners, identifying and addressing barriers to success, and earning and maintaining trust are components that contribute to the effectiveness of PPPs. Case studies in plant pathology demonstrate the positive impact PPPs can have on partners and stakeholders and provide guidance on the formation of PPPs in the future.

Plant pathogens are a critical component of the microbiome that exist as populations undergoing ecological and evolutionary processes within their host. Many aspects of virulence rely on social interactions mediated through multiple forms of public goods, including quorum-sensing signals, exoenzymes, and effectors. Virulence and disease progression involve life-history decisions that have social implications with large effects on both host and microbe fitness, such as the timing of key transitions. Considering the molecular basis of sequential stages of plant-pathogen interactions highlights many opportunities for pathogens to cheat, and there is evidence for ample variation in virulence. Case studies reveal systems where cheating has been demonstrated and others where it is likely occurring. Harnessing the social interactions of pathogens, along with leveraging novel sensing and -omics technologies to understand microbial fitness in the field, will enable us to better manage plant microbiomes in the interest of plant health.

During the Cold War, coffee became a strategically important crop in the global contest between the United States and the Soviet Union. The economies of many US allies in Latin America depended upon coffee. In the Cold War context, then, the coffee leaf rust (Hemileia vastatrix) became a geopolitical problem. Coffee experts in Latin America, which produced most of the world's coffee, began to prepare for an outbreak. In the 1950s, they built a global network of coffee experts. This network was sustained by US-led Cold War programs that promoted technical collaboration across the Global South, such as Harry Truman's Point Four programs. We explore the network's growth and evolution through one of its central figures, the American plant pathologist Frederick L. Wellman. This network has survived the end of the Cold War and evolved to reflect the new geopolitical context.

Focusing on the discovery and characterization of the Arabidopsis disease resistance protein RPS5 and its guardee PBS1, this review discusses work done in the Innes laboratory from the initial identification of the RPS5 gene in 1995 to the recent deployment of the PBS1 decoy system in crops. This is done through discussion of the structure, function, and signaling environment of RPS5 and PBS1, highlighting collaborations and influential ideas along the way. RPS5, a nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat (NLR) protein, is activated by the proteolytic cleavage of PBS1. We have shown that the cleavage site within PBS1 can be altered to contain cleavage sites for other proteases, enabling RPS5 activation by these proteases, thereby conferring resistance to different pathogens. This decoy approach has since been translated into crop species using endogenous PBS1 orthologs and holds strong potential for GMO-free development of new genetic resistance against important crop pathogens.

Plant viruses were first implemented as heterologous gene expression vectors more than three decades ago. Since then, the methodology for their use has varied, but we propose it was the merging of technologies with virology tools, which occurred in three defined steps discussed here, that has driven viral vector applications to date. The first was the advent of molecular biology and reverse genetics, which enabled the cloning and manipulation of viral genomes to express genes of interest (vectors 1.0). The second stems from the discovery of RNA silencing and the development of high-throughput sequencing technologies that allowed the convenient and widespread use of virus-induced gene silencing (vectors 2.0). Here, we briefly review the events that led to these applications, but this treatise mainly concentrates on the emerging versatility of gene-editing tools, which has enabled the emergence of virus-delivered genetic queries for functional genomics and virology (vectors 3.0).