Chai Jijie and collaborators in the School of Life Sciences first revealed the bifunctional disease resistance mechanism of plant immune receptor proteins

In a long battle against pathogenic bacteria, plants have evolved a fine, complex, multi-layered immune system to protect themselves from aggression
.

On September 21, 2022, the team of Professor Chai Jijie of Tsinghua University and the team of Professor Wang Yuanchao of Nanjing Agricultural University collaborated to publish a study entitled "Plant receptor-like protein activation by a microbial glycoside" in the international authoritative academic journal Nature magazine hydrolase's research paper, by elagnosing the structure of receptor RXEG1 alone (apo-RXEG1), receptor-ligand recognition (RXEG1-XEG1) and receptor-ligand-coreceptor complex (RXEG1-XEG1-BAK1), combined with biochemistry and plant cell biology and other means to further elucidate the specific mechanisms of
its function 。 The mechanism of action of cell membrane receptor protein RXEG1 in identifying the core pathogenic factor XEG1 of pathogenic bacteria activates plant immunity is elucidated, and the dual immune function of cell membrane receptor protein with activation immune activity and direct inhibition of pathogenic factor XEG1 enzyme activity is revealed for the first time, which has important guiding significance
for understanding, rational use and precise modification of plant immune receptors and improving crop broad-spectrum resistance.

Figure 1 Schematic diagram of RXEG1 receptor recognition of pathogenic factor XEG1 activating immunity

The study found that RXEG1 binds XEG1
primarily through two unique loops formed by extracellular N-terminal caps and C-terminal island regions.

Figure 2 RXEG1-XEG1-BAK1 complex structure

Interestingly, the study found that the two loop regions of the receptor RXEG1 fit exactly in the pockets of the enzyme-active site of XEG1
.

In summary, the study revealed for the first time the molecular mechanism of ligand recognition and activation of plant immune receptor proteins, and discovered the dual functions
of plant receptor proteins in the immune process.

Professor Chai Jijie of the School of Life Sciences of Tsinghua University, Professor Wang Yuanchao of the College of Plant Protection of Nanjing Agricultural University, Han Zhifu, Associate Researcher of the School of Life Sciences of Tsinghua University, and Associate Professor Wang Yan of the College of Plant Protection of Nanjing Agricultural University are co-corresponding authors
。 Sun Yue, a 2018 doctoral student in the School of Life Sciences of Tsinghua University, Associate Professor Wang Yan of the College of Plant Protection of Nanjing Agricultural University and Tsinghua University have left the doctoral program, Zhang Xiaoxiao, an associate researcher at ShanghaiTech University, is the co-first author of the paper, Xia Yeqiang, a postdoctoral fellow at the College of Plant Protection of Nanjing Agricultural University, Zhaodan Chen, Lei Wang, and Yujing Sun, doctoral students, Mingmei Zhang, a master's student, and Xiao Yu, a postdoctoral fellow at the School of Life Sciences of Tsinghua University, also participated in the research work
.

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