A Rare Sugar, D-Allose, Confers Resistance to Rice Bacterial Blight with Up-regulation of Defense-Related Genes in Oryza sativa

• Published in: Phytopathology Vol. 100; no. 1; pp. 85 - 90
• Main Authors: Kano, A, Gomi, K, Yamasaki-Kokudo, Y, Satoh, M, Fukumoto, T, Ohtani, K, Tajima, S, Izumori, K, Tanaka, K, Ishida, Y, Tada, Y, Nishizawa, Y, Akimitsu, K
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 01.01.2010
• Subjects: Bacteria; Oryza sativa; Xanthomonas oryzae
• ISSN: 0031-949X
• DOI: 10.1094/PHYTO-100-1-0085

We investigated responses of rice plant to three rare sugars, D-altrose, D-sorbose, and D-allose, due to establishment of mass production methods for these rare sugars. Root growth and shoot growth were significantly inhibited by D-allose but not by the other rare sugars. A large-scale gene expression analysis using a rice microarray revealed that D-allose treatment causes a high upregulation of many defense-related, pathogenesis-related (PR) protein genes in rice. The PR protein genes were not upregulated by other rare sugars. Furthermore, D-allose treatment of rice plants conferred limited resistance of the rice against the pathogen Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae but the other tested sugars did not. These results indicate that D-allose has a growth inhibitory effect but might prove to be a candidate elicitor for reducing disease development in rice.