Revealing the Mechanisms of plant bZIP transcription factors supporting susceptibility against the bacterial pathogen Pseudomonas syringae.

Arabidopsis transcription factor bZIP11 plays as a susceptibility factor during pathogenic bacteria Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato (Prior et al. 2021). P. syringae infection induces bZIP11 in type III effector-dependent manner. bZIP11 is a member of so-called C/S1bZIP network is proposed to act as a signaling hub that coordinates plant development and stress responses. bZIP11 directly or indirectly controls hundreds of metabolites, especially under low energy conditions. We hypothesize that using the typeIII effectors P. syringae alters plant metabolites via hacking the bZP11 signaling network. 

In this project, our aim is to identify :

1. typeIII effector(s) associated with modulation of the bZP11 signaling network.

2. down-stream targets of the bZIP11 network.

3. metabolites that are altered by the bZIP11 network during P. syringae infection. 

Key tools and approaches:

Arabidopsis mutant library, P. syringae type III effector mutant strains, chlorophyll fluorescence imaging, gene expression analysis, confocal microscopy ChIPseq, metabolomic profiling, etc. 

Associated researchers: 

Johannes Hanson (PI), Jamil Chowdhury (Planning and implementation), and Brian Kvitko (collaborator)