<Beta>-Aminobutyric Acid-Mediated Enhancement of Resistance In
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Physiological and Molecular Plant Pathology (2000) 56, 95–106 doi:10.1006\pmpp.1999.0255, available online at http:\\www.idealibrary.com on β-Aminobutyric acid-mediated enhancement of resistance in tobacco to tobacco mosaic virus depends on the accumulation of salicylic acid J. SIEGRIST*, M. OROBER and H. BUCHENAUER Institute of Phytomedicine, Uniersity of Hohenheim, D-70593 Stuttgart, Germany (Accepted for publication December 1999) A number of chemical and biological agents are known as inducers of systemic acquired resistance (SAR) to tobacco mosaic virus (TMV) in tobacco plants. In the present study, a local spray application of the non-protein amino acid DL-β-aminobutyric acid (BABA) was effective in enhancing resistance to TMV in tobacco plants containing the N gene. In contrast, the isomer α-aminobutyric acid (AABA) showed a much lower activity whereas γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) was completely inactive, indicating a strong isomer specificity of aminobutyric acid in triggering enhanced virus resistance. Rapid cell death was detected in tobacco leaf tissues after foliar application of BABA, subsequently resulting in the development of macroscopically visible, necrotic lesions. BABA-induced cell death was associated with the rapid generation of superoxide and hydrogen peroxide. As further consequences, the occurrence of lipid peroxidation in treated tissues, a local and systemic increase of salicylic acid (SA) levels and the expression of PR-1a, a molecular marker of SAR in tobacco, could be observed. None of these responses was detectable after treatment with GABA. Enhancement of virus resistance by BABA was found to be strictly dependent on SA-mediated signal transduction since it could not be detected in salicylate hydroxylase (nahG) expressing transgenic tobacco plants. These findings suggest that in tobacco, primary processes triggered by foliar application of BABA, resemble those initiated by microbes during a hypersensitive response (HR) that result in SAR activation. # 2000 Academic Press Keywords: β-Aminobutyric acid; BTH; hypersensitive response; reactive oxygen species; systemic acquired resistance; tobacco; tobacco mosaic virus. INTRODUCTION In this relation, scientific activities were mainly focused on the phenomenon of induced disease resistance. In Natural disease resistance of plants is based on preformed general, induced resistance can be defined as an activation and inducible mechanisms. The latter are activated in the of mechanisms that allow plants to defend themselves case of pathogen contact as an active response of plant against a broad spectrum of pathogens without any cells after recognition of the invader. Defense mechanisms changes of the plant genome [51]. Depending on the can be expressed locally, at the site of pathogen attacked activating stimulus, induced resistance can be devided in cells as well as systemically, in uninfected tissues. They pathogen-induced systemic acquired resistance (SAR) include changes like papilla formation, cell wall ligni- and rhizobacteria-mediated induced systemic resistance fication, production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), (ISR). In the case of SAR, SA-dependent signal trans- initiation of a hypersensitive reaction (HR), expression of duction was found to be imperative for triggering defense pathogenesis-related proteins (PRs) and accumulation of responses [27, 34]. In contrast, ISR seems to operate in an antimicrobial metabolites [28]. In recent years, the battery SA-independent manner [39]. Essential elements of the of the plants’ own defense reactions has attracted a lot of SAR and the ISR pathway have already been charac- attention both in applied agriculture and basic research. terized [15, 52]. Several natural and synthetic agents have been decribed * To whom all correspondence should be adressed. E-mail: as activators of defense-related processes when applied to jsieg!uni-hohenheim.de Abbreviations used in the text: AABA, DL-α-aminobutyric plants and some of these may have potential application acid; BABA, DL-β-aminobutyric acid; BTH, in agriculture [26, 58]. However, in only a few cases have benzo[1,2,3]thiadiazole-7-carbothioic acid-S-methyl ester; the criteria definded by Kessmann et al.[26] been clearly DAB, diaminobenzidine; GABA, γ-aminobutyric acid; HR, demonstrated. Thus, besides an effective disease control, hypersensitive response; NBT, nitroblue tetrazolium; ROS, re- chemical agents should be shown to induce plant specific active oxygen species; SA, salicylic acid; SAR, systemic acquired resistance; TBARS, thiobarbituric acid reactive sub- defense responses. At the moment, the best characterized stances; TMV, tobacco mosaic virus. compounds within the group of chemical activators of 0885–5765\00\030095j12 $35.00\0 # 2000 Academic Press 96 J. Siegrist et al. disease resistance are 2,6-dichloroisonicotinic acid (INA) was provided by L. Friedrich (Novartis Ltd., Research and benzo[1, 2, 3]thiadiazole-7-carbothioic acid-S-methyl Triangle Park, U.S.A.). ester (BTH) which are both synthetic substances. These inducers were used in a number of recently published studies dealing with mechanisms involved in SAR [45]. Plants With the help of transgenic tobacco and Arabidopsis Seeds of transgenic PR-1a:uidA tobacco plants [10] were plants that constitutively express the bacterial nahG gene provided by D. F. Klessig (Rutgers University, NJ, encoding a salicylate hydroxylase, it was demonstrated U.S.A.), seeds of transgenic NahG-10 tobacco [18] came that both chemicals enter the SAR signalling pathway from K. Lawton (Novartis Ltd., Research Triangle Park, downstream of SA [17, 53]. Meanwhile, BTH was U.S.A.). Non-transgenic tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum cv. 2 introduced as a commercial product (Bion , Novartis Xanthi-nc), bearing the N gene derived from Nicotiana Ltd., Basel, Switzerland) in Europe for the protection of glutinosa for hypersensistive resistance to TMV, was used wheat against powdery mildew by means of SAR [19]. for inducer verification. Tobacco plants were grown 4 Other inducing agents like probenazole [55] or Milsana , under controlled conditions in a 14 h\10 h day\night an extract from the giant knotweed Reynoutria sachalinensis cycle at 24mC and 18mC, respectively. [12], were exclusively active in only a few selected pathosystems and can therefore not be considered as effective inducers in general. Inducer treatment Besides BTH and INA, the non-protein amino acid Chemical treatment was performed by spraying aqueous DL-β-aminobutyric acid (BABA) was described as SAR solutions of the aminobutyric acids (10 m) on leaves 3 inducer in several plant species belonging to the Solanaceae. and 4 of tobacco plants with six fully developed leaves. BABA treatment was effective in activating plants for a BTH (0.5 m) was applied in the form of the commercial sucessful defense against foliar diseases [7–9, 20, 47, 50] plant activator Bion2 (WP 50, Novartis Ltd., Frankfurt, and also against soilborne pathogens [4, 30]. In addition, Germany). For biological induction of resistance, cor- the inducing efficiency of BABA was recently demon- responding leaves of tobacco plants were inoculated with strated in cultured parsley cells, a model system for the TMV (10 µgml−" in 25 m sodium phosphate buffer pH testing of SAR-inducing agents [44]. In contrast to 7.0) using celite (0.1 mg ml−") as abrasive. BABA, the isomers DL-α-aminobutyric acid (AABA) and γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) showed only weak or no activity in parsley cell cultures [44] and in all plant– Challenge inoculation with TMV pathogen interactions tested so far [7–9, 20, 47, 50]. This indicates a high isomer specificity of aminobutyric acid in Control plants and inducer-treated tobacco plants were µ −" defense activation. challenge inoculated on leaf 5 with TMV (10 gml in In tomato, Cohen and coworkers were able to correlate 25 m phosphate buffer pH 7.0). Since N gene tobacco BABA-induced resistance to Phytophthora infestans with the is genetically resistant to TMV by local lesion formation, accumulation of several PR proteins in treated and in evaluation of inducer effects on these plants was performed non-treated parts of the plants [8]. When tested in itro, 7 days after inoculation by counting the number of local BABA exhibited no direct activity against various lesions as well as by measuring the diameter of 20 lesions pathogens [7–9, 20, 47, 50] which is a further important on each leaf. In this system, effective inducers mediate an prerequisite for abiotic inducers of disease resistance [26]. enhancement of resistance by reducing the symptom However, except for these biochemically based studies on severity [17]. BABA-activated mechanisms, the mode of action of this resistance-inducing chemical was not further examined in Quantification of SA detail. In the present study the classical SAR test system tobacco-tobacco mosaic virus (TMV) was used to gain an Total contents of SA (the sum of free and conjugated SA) insight into primary BABA-induced processes in plants. in tobacco leaves were determined according to Mo$ lders et al.[37] with some modifications. For SA extraction, tobacco leaf material (1 g) was grinded in liquid nitrogen MATERIALS AND METHODS and subsequently homogenized in a mortar after addition of 5 ml MeOH (90% v\v). The homogenate was Materials centrifuged for 15 min at 4mC with 15000 rpm and the BTH was supplied by K.-L. Nau (Novartis Ltd., resulting supernatant carefully removed. After resus- Frankfurt, Germany). BABA was purchased from Fluka penion of the pellet in 5 ml MeOH (90% v\v) and a (Buchs, Switzerland), all other chemicals came from further centrifugation, both methanolic supernatants were Sigma (Deisenhofen, Germany). Tobacco PR-1a c-DNA combined and vacuum-reduced to 1\10 of the original β-Aminobutyric acid-mediated enhancement of resistance to tobacco mosaic irus 97 volume. Extracts were directly hydrolysed for 2 h at 80mC GUS activity is given in nanomoles MU mg−" protein h−" in the presence of 10 HCl to release glucosidically at 37mC. Protein content of samples was determined bound SA. After acidic hydrolysis, pH of the extract was according to Bradford [3]. adjusted to 6.5 with 1 NaOH.