Abstract
Cereal cyst nematode (Heterodera avenae) is attracted to and aggregated around wheat roots to initiate infection, but this interaction between wheat and the nematode is not fully understood. The transcriptional responses of both wheat and H. avenae were examined during their early contact stage by mRNA sequencing analysis; certain numbers of the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were validated using quantitative real-time PCR. The immobile host wheat root only had 93 DEGs (27 up-regulated and 66 down-regulated), while the mobile plant parasitic nematode reacted much more actively with 879 DEGs (867 up-regulated and 12 down-regulated). Among them, a number of wheat DEGs (mostly down-regulated) were involved in biotic stress pathways, while several putative effector genes were up-regulated in the nematode DEGs. One putative chitinase-like effector gene of H. avenae was able to suppress BAX-triggered programmed cell death in Nicotiana benthamiana. Results of these experiments demonstrated that nematode responded more actively than wheat during the contact stage of parasitism. The parasite’s responses mainly involved up-regulation of genes including at least one anti-plant-defence effector gene, whereas the host responses mainly involved down-regulation of certain defence-related genes.
Highlights
Plant-parasitic nematodes (PPNs) have caused extensive damage to many plant species[1]
The ribosome pathway was more active in the responses of cereal cyst nematodes (CCNs) exposed to and contacting with wheat roots than were the other pathways, which indicates that protein translation is much more active
The differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in those functional categories were the most strongly induced in the nematodes responding to exposure to the wheat roots
Summary
Plant-parasitic nematodes (PPNs) have caused extensive damage to many plant species[1] Cyst nematodes, such as Heterodera spp. and Globodera spp. on cereal crops and soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merr.), and root-knot nematode (RKN, Meloidogyne spp.), are the most widely studied species because of their economic importance[2]. Heterodera avenae Wollenweber is globally one of the most important species of the cereal cyst nematodes (CCNs) It occurs in about 80% of the wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) growing areas in China[3]. During the interaction between CCN and Aegilops variabilis Eig., the transcriptome of both CCN and Ae. variabilis roots were analyzed at 30 h, 3 d, and 9 d post inoculation[28,32] Those studies identified 7,408 unigenes and three pathways in Ae. variabilis associated with plant stress resistance. Comparative transcriptome analysis of susceptible and resistant wheat cultivars was used to study the defence responses of wheat against H. avenae during the early infection stages (i.e., 24 h, 3 d and 8 d post infection), which resulted in the identification of 606 resistance genes and diverse defence-related pathways[31]
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