PubMed · 2026-06-15
Researchers discovered that silicon activates a two-protein calcium signaling switch inside tomato plants that dramatically boosts their resistance to bacterial wilt, a soil-borne disease that can devastate entire crops. The key players are two interacting proteins (SlCBL and SlCML24) whose activity surged nearly 97-fold when silicon-treated tomatoes were exposed to the pathogen.
Silicon treatment caused a 96.88-fold increase in the SlCBL defense gene in tomato plants actively infected with bacterial wilt pathogen Ralstonia solanacearum.
Tomato plants with SlCBL knocked out via CRISPR/Cas9 showed greater wilting severity, higher disease indices, and reduced activity of protective enzymes (CAT, POD, SOD) even when given silicon.
The SlCBL protein physically binds to a partner protein SlCML24, forming a calcium signaling module that is the central relay for silicon's disease-resistance effect.
