Downy Mildew effector HaRxL21 interacts with the transcriptional repressor TOPLESS to promote pathogen susceptibility

Sarah Harvey, Priyanka Kumari, Dmitry Lapin, Thomas Griebel, Richard Hickman, Wenbin Guo, Runxuan Zhang, Jane E. Parker, Jim Beynon, Katherine Denby (Lead / Corresponding author), Jens Steinbrenner (Lead / Corresponding author)

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

32 Citations (Scopus)
126 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Hyaloperonospora arabidopsidis (Hpa) is an oomycete pathogen causing Arabidopsis downy mildew. Effector proteins secreted from the pathogen into the plant play key roles in promoting infection by suppressing plant immunity and manipulating the host to the pathogen's advantage. One class of oomycete effectors share a conserved 'RxLR' motif critical for their translocation into the host cell. Here we characterize the interaction between an RxLR effector, HaRxL21 (RxL21), and the Arabidopsis transcriptional co-repressor Topless (TPL). We establish that RxL21 and TPL interact via an EAR motif at the C-terminus of the effector, mimicking the host plant mechanism for recruiting TPL to sites of transcriptional repression. We show that this motif, and hence interaction with TPL, is necessary for the virulence function of the effector. Furthermore, we provide evidence that RxL21 uses the interaction with TPL, and its close relative TPL-related 1, to repress plant immunity and enhance host susceptibility to both biotrophic and necrotrophic pathogens.

Original languageEnglish
Article numbere1008835
Number of pages30
JournalPLoS Pathogens
Volume16
Issue number8
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 12 Aug 2020

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Parasitology
  • Microbiology
  • Immunology
  • Molecular Biology
  • Genetics
  • Virology

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