Plant cysteine-rich peptides that inhibit pathogen growth and control rhizobial differentiation in legume nodules

Maróti, Gergely and Downie, J. Allan and Kondorosi, Éva (2015) Plant cysteine-rich peptides that inhibit pathogen growth and control rhizobial differentiation in legume nodules. CURRENT OPINION IN PLANT BIOLOGY, 26. pp. 57-63. ISSN 1369-5266

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Abstract

Plants must co-exist with both pathogenic and beneficial microbes. Antimicrobial peptides with broad antimicrobial activities represent one of the first lines of defense against pathogens. Many plant cysteine-rich peptides with potential antimicrobial properties have been predicted. Amongst them, defensins and defensin-like peptides are the most abundant and plants can express several hundreds of them. In some rhizobial-legume symbioses special defensin-like peptides, the nodule-specific cysteine-rich (NCR) peptides have evolved in those legumes whose symbiotic partner terminally differentiates. In Medicago truncatula, >700 NCRs exist and collectively act as plant effectors inducing irreversible differentiation of rhizobia to nitrogen-fixing bacteroids. Cationic NCR peptides have a broad range of potent antimicrobial activities but do not kill the endosymbionts. © 2015 Elsevier Ltd.

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