• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.170-182
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• 2011

Plants possess multiple resistance mechanisms that protect themselves against pathogen attack. To identify unknown components of the defense machinery in Arabidopsis, gene-expression changes were monitored in Arabidopsis thaliana under 18 different biotic or abiotic conditions using a DNA microarray representing approximately 25% of all Arabidopsis thaliana genes (www.genevestigator.com). Seventeen genes which are early responsive to salicylic acid (SA) treatment as well as pathogen infection were selected and their T-DNA insertion mutants were obtained from SALK institute. To elucidate the role of each gene in defense response, bacterial pathogen Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato (Pst) DC3000 was inoculated onto individual T-DNA insertion mutants. Four mutants exhibited decreased resistance and five mutants displayed significantly enhanced resistance against Pst DC3000-infection as measured by change in symptom development as compared to wild-type plants. Among them, member of uridin diphosphate (UDP)-glycosyltransferase (UGT) was of particular interest, since a UGT mutant (At1g05680) showed enhanced resistance to Pst-infection in Arabidopsis. In systemic acquired resistance (SAR) assay, this mutant showed enhanced activation of SAR. Also, the enhanced SAR correlated with increased expression of defense-related gene, AtPR1. These results emphasize that the glycosylation of UGT74E2 is a part of the SA-mediated disease-resistance mechanism.