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. 2025 Jan;48(1):32-50.
doi: 10.1111/pce.15071. Epub 2024 Sep 3.

Medicago truncatula SOBIR1 controls pathogen immunity and specificity in the Rhizobium-legume symbiosis

Baptiste Sarrette  1 , Thi-Bich Luu  1 , Alexander Johansson  1 , Judith Fliegmann  2 , Cécile Pouzet  3 , Carole Pichereaux  3   4   5 , Céline Remblière  1 , Laurent Sauviac  1 , Noémie Carles  1 , Emilie Amblard  6 , Valentin Guyot  1 , Maxime Bonhomme  6 , Julie Cullimore  1 , Clare Gough  1 , Christophe Jacquet  6 , Nicolas Pauly  1   7
Affiliations

Medicago truncatula SOBIR1 controls pathogen immunity and specificity in the Rhizobium-legume symbiosis

Baptiste Sarrette et al. Plant Cell Environ. 2025 Jan.

Abstract

Medicago truncatula Nod Factor Perception (MtNFP) plays a role in both the Rhizobium-Legume (RL) symbiosis and plant immunity, and evidence suggests that the immune-related function of MtNFP is relevant for symbiosis. To better understand these roles of MtNFP, we sought to identify new interacting partners. We screened a yeast-2-hybrid cDNA library from Aphanomyces euteiches infected and noninfected M. truncatula roots. The M. truncatula leucine-rich repeat (LRR) receptor-like kinase SUPPRESSOR OF BIR1 (MtSOBIR1) was identified as an interactor of MtNFP and was characterised for kinase activity, and potential roles in symbiosis and plant immunity. We showed that the kinase domain of MtSOBIR1 is active and can transphosphorylate the pseudo-kinase domain of MtNFP. MtSOBIR1 could functionally complement Atsobir1 and Nbsobir1/sobir1-like mutants for defence activation, and Mtsobir1 mutants were defective in immune responses to A. euteiches. For symbiosis, we showed that Mtsobir1 mutant plants had both a strong, early infection defect and defects in the defence suppression in nodules, and both effects were plant genotype- and rhizobial strain-specific. This work highlights a conserved function for MtSOBIR1 in activating defence responses to pathogen attack, and potentially novel symbiotic functions of downregulating defence in association with the control of symbiotic specificity.

Keywords: LRR receptor‐like kinase; LysM receptor‐like kinase; Nod factor perception; host specificity.

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References

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