Scientists find the sensor plants use to smell fungus
Plant Signaling
If a stray gene can make wheat and maize fight off fungal disease without sacrificing growth, that's a step toward fewer fungicide sprays on the crops feeding your community.
Plants can sense when a fungus is attacking them because fungal cell walls contain a substance called chitosan, but nobody knew exactly how plants detected it. Researchers found a pair of proteins in rice, named OsFID1 and OsFID2, that team up on the plant's surface to recognize chitosan and sound the alarm. When they added this pair to wheat and maize, those crops got better at resisting fungal disease and grew normally, no stunting or trade-offs.
Key Findings
OsFID1 is an apoplast-localized DUF26 domain protein that directly binds chitosan and is essential for chitosan-triggered immunity
OsFID1 partners with the plasma membrane receptor kinase OsFID2, whose phosphorylation is required for immune signaling, forming a receptor complex that confers broad-spectrum fungal resistance
OsFID1 homologs with chitosan-binding activity are conserved across monocots and dicots, and ectopic expression in wheat and maize boosted fungal resistance without a growth penalty
chevron_right Technical Summary
Scientists discovered the molecular 'doorbell' that lets plants detect fungal invaders by sensing chitosan, a component of fungal cell walls. Adding this detection system to wheat and maize made the crops resist disease without stunting their growth.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
A pair of chitosan receptors confer broad-spectrum fungal resistance
Chitosan, a major fungal cell wall component, activates plant immunity, yet the underlying perception mechanism remains unknown. In this study, we identified OsFID1, an apoplast-localized DUF26 dom...
open_in_new Read full abstractAbstract copyright held by the original publisher.
Species Mentioned
Was this useful?
Want to tell us more? (optional)
Thanks for the note!
Something went wrong — please try again.
Too many submissions. Try again in an hour.
Targeted knockout of a host peroxisomal peptidase confers field resistance to...
The corn in your grocery store and the staple food keeping millions of East African families fed is under serious threat from a viral disease that can wipe o...
Rice is a cereal grain and in its domesticated form is the staple food of over half of the world's population, particularly in Asia and Africa. Rice is the seed of the grass species Oryza sativa —or, much less commonly, Oryza glaberrima. Asian rice was domesticated in China some 13,500 to 8,200 y...