Science
How plants distinguish beneficial from harmful microbes – Science Daily
Plants recognize beneficial microbes and keep harmful ones out, which is important for healthy plants production and global food security. Scientists have now discovered how legumes use small, well-defined motifs in receptor proteins to read molecular signals…
Legume plants fix atmospheric nitrogen with the help of symbiotic bacteria, called Rhizobia, which colonize their roots. Therefore, plants have to be able to precisely recognize their symbiont to avoid infection by pathogenic microbes. To this end, legumes use different LysM receptor proteins located on the outer cell surface of their roots. In the study published in Science, an international team of researchers led by Aarhus University show that pathogenic (chitin) or symbiotic signalling molec…
