The effect of Marjrom medicinal herb extract on the expression of some genes involve in resistance to Septoria tritici leaf blotch in two wheat Chamran and Yavarous cultivars

Leaf Septoria tritici anamorph Mycosphaerella graminicola is one of the main destructive foliar disease of wheat. Resistance cultivars and chemical pesticide are commonly methods that used to control of disease. In this research, the effect of Marjoram extract was investigated in order to induction of resistance in two resistance and sensitive cultivars of wheat. Experiment was conducted in control (without extract) and treatment (extract) conditions on resistance (Chamran) and sensitive (Yavarous) cultivar at greenhouse condition. Two days after treatment of seedling with extract, inoculation of plants had been done with Dehloran isolate of septoria tritici with 7×105spore/ml. RNA extraction and cDNA synthesis from leaf samples were prepared at 6, 12 and 24 hours after contamination for further analysis. The results showed that the expression of PR1 gene at investigated times between two cultivars at two conditions was different so that the PR1 gene expression was peaked at 6 h 2.5 fold change rather than sensitive cultivar, while the expression of Ppi gene 6h after inoculation was calculated in Yavarous show 2.5fold change rather than Chamran cultivar. Application of Marjrom extract increased the expression of PR1 gene in resistance cultivar, while Ppi gene expression increased in sensitive cultivar three fold changes. It is suggested that the use of methanolic extracts of Marjoram medicinal plant can induce resistance and activation of the plant defense system against M. graminicola fungal pathogen.