Increased disease resistance in Arabidopsis thaliana through perception of well known pathogen-associated molecular patterns

Microbe-associated molecular patterns (MAMPs) play key roles as activators of the innate immune response in animals and, analogously, as elicitors of defense responses in plants. However, there are not much investigations concerning their real importance in plant resistance against pathogens. Here we used derivatives of flagellin and Ef-Tu as two well-known MAMPs against some important fungal and bacterial pathogens on Arabidopsis thaliana. Pretreatment of Col-0 plants with both MAMPs, significantly increased the resistance of plants against B. cinerea and A. brassicicola. Growth curve of Pseudomonas syringaepv. tomato (Pst DC3000) in Arabidopsis leaves was significantly influenced by both of the MAMPs. Moreover Xanthomonas axonopodis pv. citri (Xac 306) that is a non-pathogenic bacteria on Arabidopsis, neither grow nor decline in Col-0 leaves for 48 hours after inoculation. However the number of bacteria in the plants pretreated with elf18 was significantly decreased. Results of this study clearly showed the role of innate immunity in plant resistance against pathogens.