Award details

Genetic characterisation of the Kiss-Of-Death PCD pathway

Reference	BB/K009478/1
Principal Investigator / Supervisor	Dr Patrick Gallois
Co-Investigators / Co-Supervisors
Institution	The University of Manchester
Department	School of Biological Sciences
Funding type	Research
Value (£)	333,328
Status	Completed
Type	Research Grant
Start date	01/08/2013
End date	31/01/2017
Duration	42 months

Abstract

Programmed Cell Death (PCD) has a key role in defence and development of all multicellular organisms. In plants, the relationship between developmental PCD, pathogen-induced PCD and abiotic-stress induced PCD is poorly understood. We have discovered Kiss-Of-Death (KOD), an Arabidopsis thaliana gene that appears involved in all three. KOD is a 25-amino-acid peptide which expression activates PCD. KOD-induced PCD can be suppressed by the PCD-suppressor genes AtBax-inhibitor1 and p35. KOD expression results in depolarisation of the mitochondrial membrane, an early step in plant PCD, and induces caspase-like activities. Two mutant alleles of KOD exhibit a reduced PCD of the suspensor during embryo development, reduced PCD of root hairs induced by heat shock and reduced PCD during HR induced by P. syringae. KOD expression was found to be inducible by avirulent P. syringae and abiotic stresses. The general aim of the proposal is to identify novel molecular components involved in KOD-induced PCD and to understand how these components fit into the complex pathway that regulates PCD in plants. Dex-induction of PCD by KOD over-expression constitutes a powerful tool to identify a possible receptor for KOD and to identify events that occur either immediately upstream or downstream of KOD activation using expression in known mutants, and the results of pull-down and a suppressor screen.

Summary

Programmed Cell Death (PCD) is a genetically controlled process that can promote cell self-destruction to the benefit of multicellular organisms or unicellular populations. PCD is used by plants for development and survival and is hence developmentally and environmentally regulated. For example PCD is involved in pollen development, self-incompatibility, plant embryogenesis, xylogenesis, and senescence as well as in survival response to pathogen and abiotic stresses. This suggests a complex network of regulators able to integrate various signals leading to cell self-destruction. The relationship between developmental PCD, pathogen-induced PCD and abiotic-stress induced PCD is poorly understood. We have discovered a gene called Kiss-Of-Death (KOD) that appears involved in all three. Discovering more of the molecular mechanisms underlying how plant cells use KOD to make decisions about inducing or not their own self-destruction within a surviving organism will be fascinating. In addition, being able to predictably induce or down regulate the pathway will give tools to modulate cell death in specific tissues of crops to the benefit food production.

Impact Summary

The outcome of the proposed work will be a better understanding of Programmed Cell Death activation in plants. The knowledge generated will provide experimental tools to characterise PCD pathways in general, such as PCD induced by oxidative stress, relevant to heat stress and ozone stress, ER stress-induced PCD relevant to drought and plant-fungi interaction and developmental cell death. In addition, classifying plant PCD using molecular markers from the KOD pathway would allow progress towards a molecular classification of plant PCD instead of relying on cell death morphological criteria as used so far. Other important beneficiaries will be plant scientists working in the areas of plant signalling in relation to stress response, development and biofuel production. The distinctive feature of this project is the focus at the central mechanism of Programmed Cell Death in plants. We can expect a general impact of the identification of novel peptide-mediated regulatory steps of plant cell death on a multitude of fields in plant biology research. Obvious benefits for applied research will be in the identification of genes that can down regulate PCD in plants under stress or during storage. There is a potential to increase crop ozone resistance, and to control crop architecture and development. Knowledge of KOD activated pathways (genes and mechanisms of activation) can be employed by applied research in the public and private sector, for example through molecular breeding or transgenic approaches, to increase crop yield or to improve biofuel production. Intellectual property (IP) will be identified, protected and disseminated by patents; the Universities of Manchester have specialised staff to advise and assist with this process. Other findings will be presented at conferences and in top peer-reviewed journals. In the long term, the lab aims at building links between fundamental science and bio-industry and the commercialisation of promising results emanating from research projects. The University of Manchester has several excellent channels to disseminate results to the wider public and to schools through various public events during the year.

Committee	Research Committee B (Plants, microbes, food & sustainability)
Research Topics	Plant Science
Research Priority	X – Research Priority information not available
Research Initiative	X - not in an Initiative
Funding Scheme	X – not Funded via a specific Funding Scheme

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