State Key Laboratory of Hybrid Rice, College of Life Sciences, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China.
National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, China.
Nat Genet. 2018 Feb;50(2):297-306. doi: 10.1038/s41588-018-0039-6. Epub 2018 Jan 22.
The brown planthopper (BPH) and white-backed planthopper (WBPH) are the most destructive insect pests of rice, and they pose serious threats to rice production throughout Asia. Thus, there are urgent needs to identify resistance-conferring genes and to breed planthopper-resistant rice varieties. Here we report the map-based cloning and functional analysis of Bph6, a gene that confers resistance to planthoppers in rice. Bph6 encodes a previously uncharacterized protein that localizes to exocysts and interacts with the exocyst subunit OsEXO70E1. Bph6 expression increases exocytosis and participates in cell wall maintenance and reinforcement. A coordinated cytokinin, salicylic acid and jasmonic acid signaling pathway is activated in Bph6-carrying plants, which display broad resistance to all tested BPH biotypes and to WBPH without sacrificing yield, as these plants were found to maintain a high level of performance in a field that was heavily infested with BPH. Our results suggest that a superior resistance gene that evolved long ago in a region where planthoppers are found year round could be very valuable for controlling agricultural insect pests.
褐飞虱和白背飞虱是水稻上最具破坏性的害虫，它们对整个亚洲的水稻生产构成了严重威胁。因此，迫切需要鉴定抗虫基因，并培育抗飞虱的水稻品种。在这里，我们报道了一个赋予水稻抗飞虱特性的基因 Bph6 的图位克隆和功能分析。Bph6 编码一个以前未被描述的蛋白，该蛋白定位于外泌体，并与外泌体亚基 OsEXO70E1 相互作用。Bph6 的表达增加了胞吐作用，并参与细胞壁的维持和增强。在携带 Bph6 的植物中，细胞分裂素、水杨酸和茉莉酸信号通路被激活，这些植物对所有测试的褐飞虱生物型和白背飞虱表现出广泛的抗性，而不牺牲产量，因为这些植物在褐飞虱严重发生的田间仍保持着较高的性能水平。我们的研究结果表明，一个在常年有飞虱的地区进化而来的优良抗性基因，对于控制农业害虫可能非常有价值。
