A Single‐Nucleotide Mutation in a GLUTAMATE RECEPTOR‐LIKE Gene Confers Resistance to Fusarium Wilt in Gossypium hirsutum

Abstract

Fusarium wilt (FW) disease of cotton, caused by the fungus Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. vasinfectum (Fov), causes severe losses in cotton production worldwide. Though significant advancements have been made in development of FW‐resistant Upland cotton (Gossypium hirsutum) in resistance screening programs, the precise resistance genes and the corresponding molecular mechanisms for resistance to Fov remain unclear. Herein it is reported that Fov7, a gene unlike canonical plant disease‐resistance (R) genes, putatively encoding a GLUTAMATE RECEPTOR‐LIKE (GLR) protein, confers resistance to Fov race 7 in Upland cotton. A single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) (C/A) in GhGLR4.8, resulting in an amino acid change (L/I), is associated with Fov resistance. A PCR‐based DNA marker (GhGLR4.8SNP(A/C)) is developed and shown to cosegregate with the Fov resistance. CRISPR/Cas9‐mediated knockout of Fov7 results in cotton lines extremely susceptible to Fov race 7 with a loss of the ability to induce calcium influx in response to total secreted proteins (SEPs) of Fov. Furthermore, coinfiltration of SEPs with GhGLR4.8A results in a hypersensitive response. This first report of a GLR‐encoding gene that functions as an R gene provides a new insight into plant–pathogen interactions and a new handle to develop cotton cultivars with resistance to Fov race 7.

The impact of pRAP vectors on plant genetic transformation and pathogenesis studies including an analysis of BRI1-ASSOCIATED RECEPTOR KINASE 1 (BAK1)-mediated resistance

“…Furthermore, the approach of candidate gene testing in the G. hirsutum for FOV7 has demonstrated that important genes (i.e. G. hirsutum GLUTAMATE RECEPTOR LIKE 4.8 (GLR4.8)) that underlie resistance can be identified (Liu et al 2021). Consequently, model approaches used in one pathosystem have applicability to solve newly emerging ones or ones where the candidate genes are already identified (Smigocki et al 2013;Smigocki 2016, 2018).…”

Quantitative Trait Locus Mapping and Identification of Candidate Genes for Resistance to Fusarium Wilt Race 7 Using a Resequencing-Based High Density Genetic Bin Map in a Recombinant Inbred Line Population of Gossypium barbadense

“… Wang et al (2009) was the first to use molecular mapping technology to identify four QTLs, including one major gene (FwR) on D03, for FOV7 resistance in early segregating populations (F 2:3 ) of G. hirsutum based on SSR markers. Most recently, Liu et al (2021) reported that Gh_D03G0209 (named GhGLR4.8 ) on D03 encoding a GLUTAMATE RECEPTOR-LIKE (GLR) protein was the candidate gene for the resistance gene Fov7 within the 1.97–2.37 Mb region based on a GWAS of 290 Chinese G. hirsutum accessions and CRISPR/Cas9-mediated knockout analysis. The region containing FOV7 is within the region (0.99–3.01 Mb) of the common QTL qFOV7-D03-1 identified in this study.…”

“…In a subsequent SSR-based marker analysis, a dominant resistance gene ( F W R ), presumably one of the two major resistance genes ( F W 1 and F W 2 ), was mapped to chromosome D03 (c17), using two F 2:3 populations ( Wang et al, 2009 ). Most recently, through a genome-wide association study (GWAS) on 290 Chinese Upland accessions followed with a CRISPR/Cas9-mediated knockout, Gh_D03G0209 (named GhGLR4.8 ) on D03 encoding a GLUTAMATE RECEPTOR-LIKE (GLR) protein was identified as the candidate gene for the resistance gene Fov7 ( Liu et al, 2021 ). Fov7 is presumably one of the two major resistance genes identified and named earlier by Feng et al (1998) .…”

Optimizing the Protein Fluorescence Reporting System for Somatic Embryogenesis Regeneration Screening and Visual Labeling of Functional Genes in Cotton

“…In addition, rapid advances in genome sequencing technology and bioinformatics have revealed numerous uncharacterized genes, increasing sequence availability to researchers and enabling them to develop efficient tools for gene function studies in cotton (Li et al, 2014;Zhang et al, 2015;Wang et al, 2019;Ma et al, 2021). In the last decade, a series of genes involving important traits have been cloned, including MYB25 (Machado et al, 2009), GRLs (Liu et al, 2021), GhSP (McGarry et al, 2016, GoPGF (Ma et al, 2016), and CGP1 (Gao et al, 2020), which control cotton fiber initiation, disease resistance, plant architecture and flowering, pigment gland formation, and gland pigmentation, respectively. The CRISPR system has allowed the utilization of the identified genes in cotton improvement and breeding (Gao et al, 2017;Long et al, 2018;Wang et al, 2018).…”