Nutrient Uptake and Metabolic Adaptation by the Oomycete Plant Pathogen Phytophthora Infestans

University Of California-Riverside, Riverside CA

Investigators

Abstract

Two indispensable attributes of all organisms are the abilities to absorb nutrients and adapt their metabolism to changes in the environment. The Judelson laboratory will study these processes in the microbe Phytophthora infestans, which causes the economically important late blight diseases of potato and tomato. P. infestans is believed to absorb nutrients during plant infection through the use of specialized structures that it inserts into host cells, and to adjust its metabolism to adapt to the nutrients encountered in its different hosts, but neither phenomenon is well-understood. A combination of molecular and cellular tools will be used to explore these processes, such as methods to identify genes that are turned on and off in response to different feeding conditions and techniques to localize within P. infestans the proteins that participate in nutrient sensing and uptake. This work is significant since organisms like P. infestans cause disease on hundreds of different plant species, and those diseases are difficult to control with existing tools. The research may lead to practical applications, such as inhibitors of the pathways used to assimilate nutrients which might be used to reduce the incidence of disease. The project also integrates research, education, and outreach at several levels as it will support junior scientists and graduate students, as well as undergraduates that might be interested in careers in science.