www.checkbiotech.org ; www.raupp.info ; www.czu.cz

Root-knot nematodes (RKN) are the most economically important group of
plant-parasitic nematodes worldwide, attacking nearly 2000 species of crop
and fiber plants, November 2006.

The nematode invades plant roots, and by feeding on the roots? cells, they
cause the roots to grow large galls, or knots, damaging the crop and
reducing its yields. Led by professor Richard Hussey, researchers from the
University of Georgia, Iowa State University, and North Carolina State
University engineered root-knot nematode resistance in transgenic plants by
silencing or ?knocking out? an essential gene that causes the nematode to
become parasitic. The result of their study is published in a recent issue
of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

The research group described experiments to silence the parasitism gene
16D10 in root-knot nematode, and they confirm that the gene is essential for
root-knot nematode to exhibit parasitism. In addition, expression of the
same regulator for 16D10 in Arabidopsis resulted in resistance against the
four major RKN species. The results of silencing of parasitism gene 16D10 in
RKN could lead to the development of crops with broad resistance to this
destructive pathogen.

Readers can access the full article, ?Engineering broad root-knot resistance
in transgenic plants by RNAi silencing of a conserved and essential
root-knot nematode parasitism gene? at:

[www.pnas.org]

For the abstract, visit:

[www.pnas.org]

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