Abstract
Plant pathogens secrete effector proteins to suppress plant immunity. However, the mechanism by which oomycete pathogens deliver effector proteins during plant infection remains unknown. In this report, we characterized a Phytophthora sojae vps1 gene. This gene encodes a homolog of the Saccharomyces cerevisiae vacuolar protein sorting gene vps1 that mediates budding of clathrin-coated vesicles from the late Golgi, which are diverted from the general secretory pathway to the vacuole. PsVPS1-silenced mutants were generated using polyethylene glycol-mediated protoplast stable transformation and were viable but had reduced extracellular protein activity. The PsVPS1-silenced mutants showed impaired hyphal growth, and the shapes of the vacuoles were highly fragmented. Silencing of PsVPS1 affected cyst germination as well as the polarized growth of germinated cysts. Silenced mutants showed impaired invasion of susceptible soybean plants regardless of wounding. These results suggest that PsVPS1 is involved in vacuole morphology and cyst development. Moreover, it is essential for the virulence of P. sojae and extracellular protein secretion.
Highlights
Plant pathogenic oomycetes such as Phytophthora have unique physiological characteristics and devastating effects on crops and natural ecosystems [1]
We found that PsVPS1 was up-regulated during five P. sojae infection stages compared to zoospore and cyst stages, suggesting that it plays an important role during infection (Fig. 1)
In P. sojae, we identified a conserved dynamin-related protein PsVPS1, similar to VPS1 of S. cerevisiae on AA level, which contained three conserved domains
Summary
Plant pathogenic oomycetes such as Phytophthora have unique physiological characteristics and devastating effects on crops and natural ecosystems [1]. Over 100 Phytophthora species have been described [2], including P. infestans, which causes potato late blight, the disease responsible for the great Irish potato famine of the 1840s [3]. Another representative is P. sojae, which causes soybean root and stem rot and approximately $1–2 billion of damage globally each year [4,5]. The initial step in plant infection is the successful penetration of the plant surface This process involve specialized infection structures called appressoria, which can release enzymes that degrade the walls of plant cells. The pathogen can secrete a large set of effector molecules that interact with the host and establish compatibility
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