Researchers Investigate the Effect of Iron Chelator on Fire Blight Susceptibility of Pear

Previous studies reported that plants turn on defense mechanisms to decrease iron levels at infection sites through the control of ferritin, an intracellular protein that stores and releases iron. For instance, transgenic tobacco expressing alfalfa ferritin exhibited tolerance to necrotic damage due to bacterial or viral infection.

Samia Djennane and colleagues at Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA), France, conducted a study to evaluate the possibility of reducing iron availability in transgenic plants as a way of limiting invasion of host tissue. They examined the effect of iron chelator, a protein that tightly bind iron ions expressed by the pea ferritin gene, on the fire blight susceptibility of pear.

Transgenic pear clones expressing the pear ferritin gene were produced and analyzed to determine the level of expression of the transgene. Adaptation to iron deficiency of the transgenic clones was tested under different iron metabolism parameters. Results showed that the transgenes have no significant effect on iron and chlorophyll content, root reductase activity and fire blight susceptibility in greenhouse conditions when exposed to rust.

Subscribers of Plant Science journal can access the article at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.plantsci.2011.01.015.