Full Description
Many fungi and bacteria that associate with plants are potentially harmful and can cause disease, while others enter into mutually beneficial sym bioses. Co-evolution of plants with pathogenic and symbiotic microbes has lead to refined mechanisms of reciprocal recognition, defense and counter defense. Genes in both partners determine and regulate these mechanisms. A detailed understanding of these genes provides basic biological insights as well as a starting point for developing novel methods of crop protection against pathogens. This volume deals with defense-related genes of plants and their regulation as well as with the genes of microbes involved in their interaction with plants. Our discussion begins at the level of populations and addresses the complex interaction of plant and microbial genes in multigenic disease resistance and its significance for crop protection as compared to mono genic resistance (Chap. 1). Although monogenic disease resistance may have its problems in the practice of crop protection, it is appealing to the experimentalist: in the so-called gene-for-gene systems, single genes in the plant and in the pathogen specify the compatibility or incompatibility of an interaction providing an ideal experimental system for studying events at the molecular level (Chaps. 2 and 4). Good progress has been made in identifying viral, bacterial, and fungal genes important in virulence and host range (Chaps. 3-6). An important aspect of plant-microbe interactions is the exchange of chemical signals. Microbes can respond to chemical signals of plant origin.
Contents
Section I Resistance and Susceptibility Genes of Plants.- The Use of Resistance Genes in Breeding: Epidemiological Considerations.- Functional Models to Explain Gene-for-Gene Relationships in Plant—Pathogen Interactions.- Section II Virulence and Avirulence Genes of Pathogens.- An Analysis of Host Range Specificity Genes of Rhizobium as a Model System for Virulence Genes in Phytobacteria.- Pathogen A virulence Genes and Elicitors of Plant Defense.- Pathogenicity Determinants in the Smut Fungi of Cereals.- Identification of Fungal Genes Involved in Plant Pathogenesis and Host Range.- Section III Perception of Pathogens and Signal Transduction.- Interactions Between Agrobacterium tumefaciens and Its Host Plant Cells.- Elicitor Recognition and Signal Transduction.- Section IV Plant Genes Induced in the Defense Reaction.- Pathogenesis-related Proteins.- The Primary Structure of Plant Pathogenesis-related Glucanohydrolases and Their Genes.- Characterization and Analysis of Thionin Genes.- Regulatory Elements Controlling Developmental and Stress-induced Expression of Phenylpropanoid Genes.- Regulation of Lignification in Defense.
