Research article - Peer-reviewed, 2021
Spray-Induced Gene Silencing as a Potential Tool to Control Potato Late Blight Disease
Kalyandurg, Pruthvi B.; Sundararajan, Poorva; Dubey, Mukesh; Ghadamgahi, Farideh; Zahid, Muhammad Awais; Whisson, Stephen C.; Vetukuri, Ramesh R.Abstract
Phytophthora infestans causes late blight disease on potato and tomato and is currently controlled by resistant cultivars or intensive fungicide spraying. Here, we investigated an alternative means for late blight control by spraying potato leaves with double-stranded RNAs (dsRNA) that target the P. infestans genes essential for infection. First, we showed that the sporangia of P. infestans expressing green fluorescent protein (GFP) can take up in vitro synthesized dsRNAs homologous to GFP directly from their surroundings, including leaves, which led to the reduced relative expression of GFP. We further demonstrate the potential of spray-induced gene silencing (SIGS) in controlling potato late blight disease by targeting developmentally important genes in P. infestans such as guanine-nucleotide binding protein beta-subunit (PiGPB1), haustorial membrane protein (PiHmp1), cutinase (PiCut3), and endo-1,3(4)-beta-glucanase (PiEndo3). Our results demonstrate that SIGS can potentially be used to mitigate potato late blight; however, the degree of disease control is dependent on the selection of the target genes.Keywords
climate change; disease control; host parasite interactions; oomycetes; pest managementPublished in
Phytopathology2021, volume: 111, number: 12, pages: 2168-2175
Authors' information
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Plant Biology
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Plant Breeding
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Forest Mycology and Plant Pathology
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Plant Breeding
Ferdowsi University of Mashhad
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Plant Protection Biology
Whisson, Stephen C.
The James Hutton Institute
Vetukuri, Ramesh (Ramesh, Vetukuri)
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Plant Breeding
UKÄ Subject classification
Agricultural Science
Publication Identifiers
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1094/PHYTO-02-21-0054-SC
URI (permanent link to this page)
https://res.slu.se/id/publ/114915