EAGER: Molecular Identification of a Geminivirus Resistance Gene in Arabidopsis

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Geminiviruses are plant DNA viruses that cause severe economic damage to tomato, cotton, corn, and other crop plants, primarily in tropical regions of the world. They are considered to be an emerging threat because of recent outbreaks that caused wide-spread famine in Uganda (cassava) and other parts of Africa (corn) and economic hardship in Pakistan and India (cotton). They are a threat to the US because of the recent introduction of Tomato yellow leaf curl virus from Israel and the possible introduction of Old World geminiviruses infecting cotton or corn. Although resistance genes for different geminiviruses have been identified in bean, tomato, corn, and other crops, none of them has been sequenced. Sequencing of a potyvirus resistance gene in Arabidopsis was a breakthrough for plant breeding because it allowed the identification of naturally occurring resistance genes in several different crop plants and also shed light on exactly which host factors were important for RNA virus infection. An Arabidopsis gene has been identified that confers resistance to two very different types of DNA virus. Such broad-based resistance would be an important complement to genetic engineering methods, such as RNAi, that are powerful but virus-specific. The goal of this project is to identify and sequence the Arabidopsis geminivirus resistance gene by determining which DNA fragments correlate with resistance in a mapping (F2) population. A cloned gene corresponding to this DNA fragment will be transformed into a susceptible plant and challenged with both geminiviruses. If the gene behaves as expected (resistance is conferred), information about the new function of the gene will be submitted to the Arabidopsis Information Resource (TAIR) and then published. This project will support a Hispanic postdoctoral student for one year.