How to convert host plants into nonhosts

Article Biotechnology & Applied Microbiology

CRISPR-induced miRNA156-recognition element mutations in TaSPL13 improve multiple agronomic traits in wheat

Ajay Gupta et al.

Summary: This study identified the SPL genes in wheat and found that mutating these genes can increase wheat yield. The TaSPL13 mutants exhibited several improved phenotypic traits that can enhance grain size, grain number, and plant architecture.

PLANT BIOTECHNOLOGY JOURNAL (2023)

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Article Microbiology

Prediction of effector protein structures from fungal phytopathogens enables evolutionary analyses

Kyungyong Seong et al.

Summary: Understanding the evolution of pathogen effectors is crucial, and this study models the structures of thousands of secreted proteins from various fungal phytopathogens. The researchers identify expanded effector families and common folds among these pathogens, as well as new classes of effector families. They also find evidence that many effector families may have originated from ancestral folds. Overall, this study uncovers diverse mechanisms of effector evolution and highlights the importance of divergent evolution in shaping effector diversity.

NATURE MICROBIOLOGY (2023)

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Article Plant Sciences

Selective deployment of virulence effectors correlates with host specificity in a fungal plant pathogen

Yoshihiro Inoue et al.

Summary: Through targeted gene knockout experiments, we identified that the hemibiotrophic fungal pathogen Colletotrichum orbiculare secretes multiple effector proteins during infection of cucurbit crops and tobacco. Four effector proteins were found to be specific for cucurbit hosts, while five others had virulence in both cucurbit crops and tobacco. This study suggests that C. orbiculare employs a host-specific effector deployment strategy when infecting cucurbit crops.

NEW PHYTOLOGIST (2023)

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Article Biochemistry & Molecular Biology

AlphaFold2-multimer guided high-accuracy prediction of typical and atypical ATG8-binding motifs

Tarhan Ibrahim et al.

Summary: This article introduces a protein modeling method called AF2-multimer, which accurately predicts AIM/LIR sequences related to autophagy in host cells. By combining evolutionary analysis of protein sequences and protein-protein interaction experiments, the researchers found that AF2-multimer can predict physiologically relevant AIM sequences and noncanonical AIM sequences in ATG3 from potato. In addition, AF2-multimer can predict pathogen-specific AIM sequences targeting ATG8 members and reveals the existence of cross-kingdom AIM/LIR associations. The application of AF2-multimer is expected to greatly accelerate our understanding of the molecular basis of autophagy in all biological kingdoms.

PLOS BIOLOGY (2023)

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Review Biochemical Research Methods

Clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats tools for plant metabolic engineering: achievements and perspectives

Sara Selma et al.

Summary: The plant kingdom is a major source of feedstock, food, and added-value compounds. Engineering plant metabolic pathways is challenging due to complex interaction networks involving multiple genes, enzymatic steps, and metabolites. However, the development of CRISPR-Cas technologies has provided efficient tools for multigene editing in plants, enabling improvements in agronomic and metabolic traits. This article provides an overview of the achievements and perspectives of CRISPR technology in plant metabolic engineering.

CURRENT OPINION IN BIOTECHNOLOGY (2023)

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Article Multidisciplinary Sciences

Exploiting breakdown in nonhost effector-target interactions to boost host disease resistance

Hazel McLellan et al.

Summary: By studying the interaction between pathogen effectors and nonhost plants, we revealed the mechanism behind nonhost resistance and demonstrated the crucial role of disrupting this interaction in immune response.

PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA (2022)

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Article Biology

A pair of effectors encoded on a conditionally dispensable chromosome of Fusarium oxysporum suppress host-specific immunity

Yu Ayukawa et al.

Summary: The genome sequence of a Fusarium oxysporum isolate contains conditionally dispensable chromosomes which play a crucial role in conferring virulence on specific hosts. The study provides insight into the mechanisms underlying F. oxysporum pathogenicity, particularly in determining host specificity through effector genes on transmissible CD chromosomes.

COMMUNICATIONS BIOLOGY (2021)

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Article Multidisciplinary Sciences

Highly accurate protein structure prediction with AlphaFold

John Jumper et al.

Summary: Proteins are essential for life, and accurate prediction of their structures is a crucial research problem. Current experimental methods are time-consuming, highlighting the need for accurate computational approaches to address the gap in structural coverage. Despite recent progress, existing methods fall short of atomic accuracy in protein structure prediction.

NATURE (2021)

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Review Biochemistry & Molecular Biology