title: Plant cysteine-rich peptides that inhibit pathogen growth and control rhizobial differentiation in legume nodules.
abstract: Plants must co-exist with both pathogenic and beneficial microbes. Antimicrobial peptides with broad antimicrobial activities represent one of the first lines of defense against pathogens. Many plant cysteine-rich peptides with potential antimicrobial properties have been predicted. Amongst them, defensins and defensin-like peptides are the most abundant and plants can express several hundreds of them. In some rhizobial-legume symbioses special defensin-like peptides, the nodule-specific cysteine-rich (NCR) peptides have evolved in those legumes whose symbiotic partner terminally differentiates. In Medicago truncatula, >700 NCRs exist and collectively act as plant effectors inducing irreversible differentiation of rhizobia to nitrogen-fixing bacteroids. Cationic NCR peptides have a broad range of potent antimicrobial activities but do not kill the endosymbionts.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Center of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Temesvári krt. 62., Szeged 6726, Hungary.
authors.forename: Gergely
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Maróti
authors.affiliation: John Innes Centre, Norwich Research Park, Norwich NR4 7UH, UK.
authors.forename: J Allan
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Downie
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Center of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Temesvári krt. 62., Szeged 6726, Hungary. Electronic address: kondorosi.eva@brc.mta.hu.
authors.forename: Éva
authors.initials: É
authors.lastname: Kondorosi
mesh_terms: D003545:Cysteine / Q000737:chemistry*; D018506:Gene Expression Regulation, Plant; D010455:Peptides / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000378:metabolism*; D012231:Rhizobium / Q000378:metabolism / Q000502:physiology*; D053204:Root Nodules, Plant / Q000382:microbiology*; D013559:Symbiosis / Q000502:physiology
chemical_list: D010455:Peptides; D003545:Cysteine