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ARS Home » Northeast Area » Ithaca, New York » Robert W. Holley Center for Agriculture & Health » Emerging Pests and Pathogens Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #404532
Research Project: Advancing Knowledge of the Biology and Etiology of Bacterial Plant Pathogens Towards Management Strategies

Location: Emerging Pests and Pathogens Research

Title: Characterizing environmental sensing mechanisms in Dickeya dadantii

Author
item GONZALEX-TOBON, JULIANA - Cornell University
item Stodghill, Paul
item Filiatrault, Melanie

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 5/15/2023
Publication Date: 8/12/2023
Citation: Gonzalex-Tobon, J., Stodghill, P., Filiatrault, M.J. 2023. Characterizing environmental sensing mechanisms in Dickeya dadantii. Meeting Abstract. Plant Health 2023.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Many bacteria sense their surrounding environment and move accordingly via chemoreceptor proteins in a process known as chemotaxis. These proteins play essential roles during the disease cycle. Members of the Dickeya genus, that cause disease on numerous crops and ornamental plants, present notoriously more methyl-accepting chemore-ceptors (MCPs) than other closely related bacteria. However, the functions and signals of many of these MCPs re-main unknown. Interestingly, long untranslated regions exist upstream of the coding regions of MCP in Dickeya. We hypothesized these regions harbor small non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs). Transcription start sites (TSSs) were identified using Cappable-seq and found to align well with the areas being transcribed that were detected via RNAseq and validated via qRT-PCR, in vitro and in planta. Using biocomputational methods we identified poten-tial promoters, putative regulatory sequences, and terminators in these regions. Together these results showed that such intergenic regions and MCPs are actively transcribed in planta. Mutants lacking these regions, as well as lack-ing the MCP genes were constructed. Results showed differences in the ability to swim and swarm in vitro, as well as when causing disease in the potato stem compared to wild-type bacteria. Our results provide new insight into the sensing and signaling mechanisms used by Dickeya and provide targets for disease control.