Frederikke Gro Malinovsky

To optimize fitness a plant should monitor its metabolism to appropriately control growth and defense. Primary metabolism can be measured by the universally conserved TOR (Target of Rapamycin) pathway to balance growth and development with the available energy and nutrients. Recent work suggests that plants may measure defense metabolites to potentially provide a strategy ensuring fast reallocation of resources to coordinate plant growth and defense. There is little understanding of mechanisms enabling defense metabolite signaling. To identify mechanisms of defense metabolite signaling, we used glucosinolates, an important class of plant defense metabolites. We report novel signaling properties specific to one distinct glucosinolate, 3-hydroxypropylglucosinolate across plants and fungi. This defense metabolite, or derived compounds, reversibly inhibits root growth and development. 3-hydroxypropylglucosinolate signaling functions via genes in the ancient TOR pathway. If this event is not unique, this raises the possibility that other evolutionarily new plant metabolites may link to ancient signaling pathways.

To optimize fitness a plant should monitor its metabolism to appropriately control growth and defense. Primary metabolism can be measured by the universally conserved TOR (Target of Rapamycin) pathway to balance growth and development with the available energy and nutrients. Recent work suggests that plants may measure defense metabolites to potentially provide a strategy ensuring fast reallocation of resources to coordinate plant growth and defense. There is little understanding of mechanisms enabling defense metabolite signaling. To identify mechanisms of defense metabolite signaling, we used glucosinolates, an important class of plant defense metabolites. We report novel signaling properties specific to one distinct glucosinolate, 3- hydroxypropyl glucosinolate across plants and fungi. This defense metabolite, or derived compounds, reversibly inhibits root growth and development. 3-hydroxypropyl glucosinolate signaling functions via genes in the ancient TOR pathway. Thus, plants might link evolutionarily new defense metabolites to ancient signaling pathways to optimize energy allocation.

Membrane trafficking is required during plant immune responses, but its contribution to the hypersensitive response (HR), a form of programmed cell death (PCD) associated with effector-triggered immunity, is not well understood. HR is induced by nucleotide binding-leucine-rich repeat (NB-LRR) immune receptors and can involve vacuole-mediated processes, including autophagy. We previously isolated lazarus (laz) suppressors of autoimmunity-triggered PCD in the Arabidopsis thaliana mutant accelerated cell death11 (acd11) and demonstrated that the cell death phenotype is due to ectopic activation of the LAZ5 NB-LRR. We report here that laz4 is mutated in one of three VACUOLAR PROTEIN SORTING35 (VPS35) genes. We verify that LAZ4/VPS35B is part of the retromer complex, which functions in endosomal protein sorting and vacuolar trafficking. We show that VPS35B acts in an endosomal trafficking pathway and plays a role in LAZ5-dependent acd11 cell death. Furthermore, we find that VPS35 homologs contribute to certain forms of NB-LRR protein-mediated autoimmunity as well as pathogen-triggered HR. Finally, we demonstrate that retromer deficiency causes defects in late endocytic/lytic compartments and impairs autophagy-associated vacuolar processes. Our findings indicate important roles of retromer-mediated trafficking during the HR; these may include endosomal sorting of immune components and targeting of vacuolar cargo.

Polysaccharides are major components of extracellular matrices and are often extensively modified post-synthetically to suit local requirements and developmental programmes. However, our current understanding of the spatiotemporal dynamics and functional significance of these modifications is limited by a lack of suitable molecular tools. Here, we report the development of a novel non-immunological approach for producing highly selective reciprocal oligosaccharide-based probes for chitosan (the product of chitin deacetylation) and for demethylesterified homogalacturonan. Specific reciprocal binding is mediated by the unique stereochemical arrangement of oppositely charged amino and carboxy groups. Conjugation of oligosaccharides to fluorophores or gold nanoparticles enables direct and rapid imaging of homogalacturonan and chitosan with unprecedented precision in diverse plant, fungal and animal systems. We demonstrated their potential for providing new biological insights by using them to study homogalacturonan processing during Arabidopsis thaliana root cap development and by analyzing sites of chitosan deposition in fungal cell walls and arthropod exoskeletons.

The battle between plants and microbes is evolutionarily ancient, highly complex and often co-dependent. A primary challenge for microbes is to breach the physical barrier of host cell walls whilst avoiding detection by the plant’s immune receptors. While some receptors sense conserved microbial features, others monitor physical changes caused by an infection attempt. Detection of microbes leads to activation of appropriate defense responses that then challenge the attack. Plant cell walls are formidable and dynamic barriers. They are constructed primarily of complex carbohydrates joined by numerous distinct connection types, and are subject to extensive post-synthetic modification to suit prevailing local requirements. Multiple changes can be triggered in cell walls in response to microbial attack. Some of these are well described, but many remain obscure. The study of the myriad of subtle processes underlying cell wall modification poses special challenges for plant glycobiology. In this review we describe the major molecular and cellular mechanisms that underlie the roles of cell walls in plant defense against pathogen attack. In so doing, we also highlight some of the challenges inherent in studying these interactions, and briefly describe the analytical potential of molecular probes used in conjunction with carbohydrate microarray technology.

Move and Countermove: Receptors on plant cell surfaces are tuned to recognize molecular patterns associated with pathogenic bacteria. Macho et al. (p. 1509 ; published online 13 March) found that activation of one of these receptors in Arabidopsis results in phosphorylation of a specific tyrosine residue, which in turn triggers the plant's immune response to the phytopathogen Pseudomonas syringae. P. syringae counters by secreting a specifically targeted phosphatase, thus stalling the plant's immune response.

Plants need to finely balance resources allocated to growth and immunity to achieve optimal fitness. A tradeoff between pathogen-associated molecular pattern (PAMP)-triggered immunity (PTI) and brassinosteroid (BR)-mediated growth was recently reported, but more information about the underlying mechanisms is needed. Here, we identify the basic helix-loop-helix (bHLH) transcription factor HOMOLOG OF BRASSINOSTEROID ENHANCED EXPRESSION2 INTERACTING WITH IBH1 (HBI1) as a negative regulator of PTI signaling in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana). HBI1 expression is down-regulated in response to different PAMPs. HBI1 overexpression leads to reduced PAMP-triggered responses. This inhibition correlates with reduced steady-state expression of immune marker genes, leading to increased susceptibility to the bacterium Pseudomonas syringae. Overexpression of the HBI1-related bHLHs BRASSINOSTEROID ENHANCED EXPRESSION2 (BEE2) and CRYPTOCHROME-INTERACTING bHLH (CIB1) partially inhibits immunity, indicating that BEE2 and CIB1 may act redundantly with HBI1. In contrast to its expression pattern upon PAMP treatment, HBI1 expression is enhanced by BR treatment. Also, HBI1-overexpressing plants are hyperresponsive to BR and more resistant to the BR biosynthetic inhibitor brassinazole. HBI1 is nucleus localized, and a mutation in a conserved leucine residue within the first helix of the protein interaction domain impairs its function in BR signaling. Interestingly, HBI1 interacts with several inhibitory atypical bHLHs, which likely keep HBI1 under negative control. Hence, HBI1 is a positive regulator of BR-triggered responses, and the negative effect of PTI is likely due to the antagonism between BR and PTI signaling. This study identifies a novel component involved in the complex tradeoff between innate immunity and BR-regulated growth.

Asparagine-linked glycosylation of proteins is an essential cotranslational and posttranslational protein modification in plants. The central step in this process is the transfer of a preassembled oligosaccharide to nascent proteins in the endoplasmic reticulum by the oligosaccharyltransferase (OST) complex. Despite the importance of the catalyzed reaction, the composition and the function of individual OST subunits are still ill defined in plants. Here, we report the function of the highly conserved OST subunit OST3/6. We have identified a mutant in the OST3/6 gene that causes overall underglycosylation of proteins and affects the biogenesis of the receptor kinase EF-TU RECEPTOR involved in innate immunity and the endo-β-1,4-glucanase KORRIGAN1 required for cellulose biosynthesis. Notably, the ost3/6 mutation does not affect mutant variants of the receptor kinase BRASSINOSTEROID-INSENSITIVE1. OST3/6 deficiency results in activation of the unfolded protein response and causes hypersensitivity to salt/osmotic stress and to the glycosylation inhibitor tunicamycin. Consistent with its role in protein glycosylation, OST3/6 resides in the endoplasmic reticulum and interacts with other subunits of the OST complex. Together, our findings reveal the importance of Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) OST3/6 for the efficient glycosylation of specific glycoproteins involved in different physiological processes and shed light on the composition and function of the plant OST complex.