Abstract Understanding the plant immune system is crucial for using genetics to protect crops from diseases. Plants resist pathogens via a two-tiered innate immune detection-and-response system. The first plant Resistance (R) gene was cloned in 1992 . Since then, many cell-surface pattern recognition receptors (PRRs) have been identified, and R genes that encode intracellular nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat receptors (NLRs) have been cloned. Here, we provide a list of characterized PRRs and NLRs. In addition to immune receptors, many components of immune signaling networks were discovered over the last 30 years. We review the signaling pathways, physiological responses, and molecular regulation of both PRR- and NLR-mediated immunity. Recent studies have reinforced the importance of interactions between the two immune systems. We provide an overview of interactions between PRR- and NLR-mediated immunity, highlighting challenges and perspectives for future research.

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Thirty years of resistance: Zig-zag through the plant immune system

Abstract Understanding the plant immune system is crucial for using genetics to protect crops from diseases. Plants resist pathogens via a two-tiered innate immune detection-and-response system. The first plant Resistance (R) gene was cloned in 1992 . Since then, many cell-surface pattern recognition receptors (PRRs) have been identified, and R genes that encode intracellular nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat receptors (NLRs) have been cloned. Here, we provide a list of characterized PRRs and NLRs. In addition to immune receptors, many components of immune signaling networks were discovered over the last 30 years. We review the signaling pathways, physiological responses, and molecular regulation of both PRR- and NLR-mediated immunity. Recent studies have reinforced the importance of interactions between the two immune systems. We provide an overview of interactions between PRR- and NLR-mediated immunity, highlighting challenges and perspectives for future research. 

/pdf/oup-accepted-manuscript-1lfjzrt2.pdf

OUP accepted manuscript

A review of the recent progress in plant genetic engineering for disease resistance highlights future challenges and opportunities in the field.

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Genetic Engineering for Disease Resistance in Plants: Recent Progress and Future Perspectives.

Plant pathogens are a significant challenge in agriculture despite our best efforts to combat them. One of the most effective and sustainable ways to manage plant pathogens is to use genetic modification (GM) and genome editing, expanding the breeder's toolkit. For use in the field, these solutions must be efficacious, with no negative effect on plant agronomy, and deployed thoughtfully. They must also not introduce a potential allergen or toxin. Expensive regulation of biotech crops is prohibitive for local solutions. With 11-30% average global yield losses and greater local impacts, tackling plant pathogens is an ethical imperative. We need to increase world food production by at least 60% using the same amount of land, by 2050. The time to act is now and we cannot afford to ignore the new solutions that GM provides to manage plant pathogens.

https://nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/nph.15967

Genetic modification to improve disease resistance in crops.

Plant immune networks

Considered responsible for one million deaths in Ireland and widespread famine in the European continent during the 1840s, late blight, caused by Phytophthora infestans, remains the most devastating disease of potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) with about 15%-30% annual yield loss in sub-Saharan Africa, affecting mainly smallholder farmers. We show here that the transfer of three resistance (R) genes from wild relatives [RB, Rpi-blb2 from Solanum bulbocastanum and Rpi-vnt1.1 from S. venturii] into potato provided complete resistance in the field over several seasons. We observed that the stacking of the three R genes produced a high frequency of transgenic events with resistance to late blight. In the field, 13 resistant transgenic events with the 3R-gene stack from the potato varieties 'Desiree' and 'Victoria' grew normally without showing pathogen damage and without any fungicide spray, whereas their non-transgenic equivalent varieties were rapidly killed. Characteristics of the local pathogen population suggest that the resistance to late blight may be long-lasting because it has low diversity, and essentially consists of the single lineage, 2_A1, which expresses the cognate avirulence effector genes. Yields of two transgenic events from 'Desiree' and 'Victoria' grown without fungicide to reflect small-scale farm holders were estimated to be 29 and 45 t/ha respectively. This represents a three to four-fold increase over the national average. Thus, these late blight resistant potato varieties, which are the farmers' preferred varieties, could be rapidly adopted and bring significant income to smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/pbi.13042

Stacking three late blight resistance genes from wild species directly into African highland potato varieties confers complete field resistance to local blight races

Induction of adventitious buds and shoots from intact leaves and stem internode segments of two recalcitrant Ugandan sweetpotato (Ipomoea batatas L.) cultivars was investigated in vitro on Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium, supplemented with 3 different levels (0.5, 2.0 and 4.0 µM) of Thidiazuron (TDZ). Shoots were regenerated in all TDZ concentrations in cvs. Kyebandula and Bwanjule. The inclusion of 0.25 µM α-Naphthalene acetic acid (NAA) in MS medium, containing TDZ (0.5 µM), improved shoot regeneration frequency from 12.1 to 22.6% for cv. Kyebandula stems and from 21.61 to 42.9% for cv. Bwanjule stems. However, there was about 10% reduction in adventitious bud induction frequency for both cultivars, when NAA was included in the medium. The highest frequency (66.7%) of adventitious bud induction was achieved from stem explants of cv. Kyebandula. The conversion of adventitious buds into shoots was improved when TDZ was reduced or completely removed in subsequent stages of culture. The number of explants forming shoots was significantly (P<0.001) higher when stem explants were cultured for 7 days on TDZ-supplemented MS medium before transfer to TDZfree MS medium supplemented with NAA. Stem internode pieces from position 3 were the best (70.0%) in adventitious bud formation. However, most buds (76.2%) were not converted to shoots. The most important application of the de novo regeneration protocol developed in this study is in genetic transformation for improvement of sweetpotato productivity.

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Thidiazuron improves adventitious bud and shoot regeneration in recalcitrant sweetpotato

Genetic transformation is considered as one of the most promising options for improvement of crop traits Current transformation methods for sweetpotato depend on plant regeneration through organogenesis or somatic embryogenesis Somatic embryogenesis and plant regeneration at a high frequency has been  restricted to a few sweetpotato varieties Three auxins namely: 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D),  4-fluoroamphetamine (4-FA) and 4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4,5-T) were investigated in this study for enhancing somatic embryogenesis from various plant organs of recalcitrant African sweetpotato cultivars  2,4-D was found to be the best (p  005) for induction of embryogenic callus Cultivar Bwanjule had the highest  (202%) embryogenic callus frequency among the five African cultivars tested The highest number of plants in this study was regenerated from the non-African cultivar variety Jonathan on media supplemented with 02 mg Zeatin The emergence of roots from callus of recalcitrant Ugandan cultivars and the comparable high embryogenic responses in this work demonstrate the potential for regenerating plants from African  cultivars that have not been regenerated before The regeneration of roots in this work could be useful for the initiation of root cultures The most important application of this work is in genetic transformation of sweet potato, particularly for improvement of resistance to weevils Key words : Embryogenesis, plant growth regulators, plant regeneration, Ipomoea batatas

/pdf/induction-of-somatic-embryogenesis-in-recalcitrant-aoyty6zone.pdf

Induction of somatic embryogenesis in recalcitrant sweetpotato ( Ipomoea batatas L.) cultivars

Sweetpotato (Ipomoea batatas Lam.) has high potential to contain hunger, malnutrition and poverty in subSaharan Africa (SSA), since it gives early yield with few inputs. However, productivity of the crop in Africa is very low due to various challenges, such as severe viral diseases and increasing attacks by sweetpotato weevils, Cylas puncticollis and C. brunneus. Effective resistance to weevils has not been identified in the sweetpotato gene pool. On the other hand, the weevil-resistance genes, cry7Aa1 and cry3Ca1 were assembled into a plasmid vector for use in genetic transformation of African sweetpotato cultivars. The parameters for efficient transfer of these genes and the conditions for de novo regeneration optimised in preliminary studies were used in the genetic transformation of Ugandan landrace ‘Kyebandula’ with Agrobacterium tumefaciens EHA 105 harbouring the plasmid pCIP84, which contains cry7Aa1, cry3Ca1 and nptII in its T-DNA. Fifty-four percent of the explants formed adventitious buds. With a mean of 7 buds formed per explant, 6.0% explants formed shoots with a mean of one shoot per explant for those explants that formed shoots on medium containing 50 mg L -1 kanamycin as a selection agent. PCR analysis using primers for cry7Aa1 showed that the transformation efficiency could be as high as 2%. These data highlight the potential of genetic transformation in transferring resistance genes and pave way for enhancement of food security through production of adapted sweetpotato weevil resistant cultivars.

ββ -GLUCURONIDASE IN RECALCITRANT UGANDAN SWEETPOTATO AND PUTATIVE TRANSFORMATION WITH TWO CRY GENES

Sweetpotato ( Ipomoea batatas Lam.) has high potential to contain hunger, malnutrition and poverty in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), since it gives early yield with few inputs. However, productivity of the crop in Africa is very low due to various challenges, such as severe viral diseases and increasing attacks by sweetpotato weevils, Cylas puncticollis and C. brunneus . Effective resistance to weevils has not been identified in the sweetpotato gene pool. On the other hand, the weevil-resistance genes, cry7Aa1 and cry3Ca1 were assembled into a plasmid vector for use in genetic transformation of African sweetpotato cultivars. The parameters for efficient transfer of these genes and the conditions for de novo regeneration optimised in preliminary studies were used in the genetic transformation of Ugandan landrace ‘Kyebandula’ with Agrobacterium tumefaciens EHA 105 harbouring the plasmid pCIP84, which contains cry7Aa1 , cry3Ca 1 and nptII in its T-DNA. Fifty-four percent of the explants formed adventitious buds. With a mean of 7 buds formed per explant, 6.0% explants formed shoots with a mean of one shoot per explant for those explants that formed shoots on medium containing 50 mg L -1 kanamycin as a selection agent. PCR analysis using primers for cry7Aa1 showed that the transformation efficiency could be as high as 2%. These data highlight the potential of genetic transformation in transferring resistance genes and pave way for enhancement of food security through production of adapted sweetpotato weevil resistant cultivars. Key Words : Agrobacterium tumefaciens, b-glucuronidase, Ipomoea batatas

https://www.ajol.info/index.php/acsj/article/download/107184/97073

A. Kiggundu

Papers

Stacking three late blight resistance genes from wild species directly into African highland potato varieties confers complete field resistance to local blight races

Thidiazuron improves adventitious bud and shoot regeneration in recalcitrant sweetpotato

Induction of somatic embryogenesis in recalcitrant sweetpotato ( Ipomoea batatas L.) cultivars

ββ -GLUCURONIDASE IN RECALCITRANT UGANDAN SWEETPOTATO AND PUTATIVE TRANSFORMATION WITH TWO CRY GENES

Transient expression of &#946-glucuronidase in recalcitrant Ugandan sweetpotato and putative transformation with two cry genes