Open AccessRPW8/HR repeats control NLR activation in Arabidopsis thaliana
Author(s) -
A. Cristina Barragan,
Rui Wu,
SangTae Kim,
Wanyan Xi,
Anette Habring,
Jörg Hagmann,
Anna-Lena Van de Weyer,
Maricris Zaidem,
William Wing Ho Ho,
George Wang,
Ilja Bezrukov,
Detlef Weigel,
Eunyoung Chae
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
plos genetics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.587
H-Index - 233
eISSN - 1553-7404
pISSN - 1553-7390
DOI - 10.1371/journal.pgen.1008313
Subject(s) - biology , genetics , arabidopsis thaliana , powdery mildew , transmembrane domain , arabidopsis , gene , amino acid , c terminus , protein domain , direct repeat , plant disease resistance , peptide sequence , pseudomonas syringae , botany , genome , mutant
In many plant species, conflicts between divergent elements of the immune system, especially nucleotide-binding oligomerization domain-like receptors (NLR), can lead to hybrid necrosis. Here, we report deleterious allele-specific interactions between an NLR and a non-NLR gene cluster, resulting in not one, but multiple hybrid necrosis cases in Arabidopsis thaliana . The NLR cluster is RESISTANCE TO PERONOSPORA PARASITICA 7 ( RPP7 ), which can confer strain-specific resistance to oomycetes. The non-NLR cluster is RESISTANCE TO POWDERY MILDEW 8 ( RPW8 ) / HOMOLOG OF RPW8 ( HR ), which can confer broad-spectrum resistance to both fungi and oomycetes. RPW8/HR proteins contain at the N-terminus a potential transmembrane domain, followed by a specific coiled-coil (CC) domain that is similar to a domain found in pore-forming toxins MLKL and HET-S from mammals and fungi. C-terminal to the CC domain is a variable number of 21- or 14-amino acid repeats, reminiscent of regulatory 21-amino acid repeats in fungal HET-S. The number of repeats in different RPW8/HR proteins along with the sequence of a short C-terminal tail predicts their ability to activate immunity in combination with specific RPP7 partners. Whether a larger or smaller number of repeats is more dangerous depends on the specific RPW8/HR autoimmune risk variant.