A synthetic biology approach to develop durable disease resistance in crops

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A billion people alive today are undernourished. Crop losses due to pests and diseases are a major obstacle towards achieving global food security. In developing countries, pests and diseases account for up to half of crop losses. In developed countries, the use of pesticides, fungicides, and other chemicals for agriculture are heavily restricted due to EU directives. New, durable, sustainable, 'green' control measures are urgently needed. Plants in the field are often under simultaneous attack from many different types of pathogens. Some of these are from above ground (i.e. the potato late blight pathogen Phytophthora infestans), and some are from below ground (i.e. microscopic nematode worms that parasitise plant roots). Both types of pathogens 'inject' proteins into the plant to hi-jack plant machinery to benefit themselves and help spread infection. These proteins (known as effectors) often interact with normal crop proteins, and in some way modify them to help the pathogen. The key research questions remain:1) How do effectors modify host proteins to promote infection? 2) Do different types of pathogens target the same host proteins? 3) Can our understanding of the molecular interaction allow us to disrupt it, favouring plant immunity? I aim to determine how pathogen effectors physically interact with plant proteins in order to direct changes to the latter so that the pathogens can no-longer manipulate them. To accomplish this I propose a collaboration between the University of Dundee in Scotland and the John Innes Centre in Norwich. The University of Dundee Division of Plant sciences, together with the James Hutton Institute, aim to apply aspects of plant breeding, pathology and ecology to allow fundamental research to be readily translated to end-users. The John Innes Centre has extensive experience of structural biology, in particular in the area of plant-pathogen interactions. Bringing together these complementary institutes is vital to achieve the aims. Potential applications and benefits:The proposed work will provide a new understanding of how pathogens can manipulate and infect their host. With this understanding, the informed re-design of specific plant proteins so they can no-longer be targeted by pathogens will undermine and prevent infection. Proteins targeted by multiple pathogens are likely to be very important to successful infection. Modifying these by editing the plant DNA will help to create a durable 'green' solution to the use of pesticides against multiple different pathogens. This could help to ensure food production and security in developing and developed countries.