Stem parasitic plant Cuscuta australis (dodder) transfers herbivory-induced signals among plants.

ABSTRACT: Cuscuta spp. (i.e., dodders) are stem parasites that naturally graft to their host plants to extract water and nutrients; multiple adjacent hosts are often parasitized by one or more Cuscuta plants simultaneously, forming connected plant clusters. Metabolites, proteins, and mRNAs are known to be transferred from hosts to Cuscuta, and Cuscuta bridges even facilitate host-to-host virus movement. Whether Cuscuta bridges transmit ecologically meaningful signals remains unknown. Here we show that, when host plants are connected by Cuscuta bridges, systemic herbivory signals are transmitted from attacked plants to unattacked plants, as revealed by the large transcriptomic changes in the attacked local leaves, undamaged systemic leaves of the attacked pla

SUBMITTER: Hettenhausen C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5559024 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature