Abstract
Non-coding, small RNAs (sRNAs) have been identified in a wide spectrum of organisms ranging from bacteria to humans; however, the role and mechanisms of these sRNA in plant immunity is largely unknown. To determine possible roles of sRNA in plant–pathogen interaction, we carried out a high-throughput sRNA sequencing of Brassica campestris using non-infected plants and plants infected with Erwinia carotovora. Consistent with our hypothesis that distinct classes of host sRNAs alerts their expression levels in response to infection, we found that: (1) host 28-nt sRNAs were strongly increased under pathogen infection; and (2) a group of host sRNAs homologous to the pathogen genome also accumulated at significantly higher level. Our data thus suggest several distinct classes of the host sRNAs may enhance their function by up-regulation of their expression/stability in response to bacterial pathogen challenges.
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Acknowledgments
The author would like to thank Dr. Yizhen Lu and Xiang Yu for their computational assistance and helpful advice during manuscript production. This work was supported by a grant from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 30871617) and a grant from the Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (No. 12ZR1435600).
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Supplementary Fig. 1
The analysis of northern blot hybridization confirmed the accumulation level of the sRNAs from the control or the Ecc-inoculated samples was consistent with deep-sequencing results. Mock: the sRNAs from the control samples; Ecc-infection: the sRNAs from the Ecc-inoculated samples. miRNA156a, miRNA159a, miRNA319a, and miRNA398b are selected for northern blot hybridization analysis, the ubiquitin RNA hybridization is used as a loading control (TIFF 500 kb)
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Sun, C.B. Characterization of the small RNA transcriptome in plant–microbe (Brassica/Erwinia) interactions by high-throughput sequencing. Biotechnol Lett 36, 371–381 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10529-013-1362-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10529-013-1362-8