Agro-Biotech News

The Crop Journal highlights the significance of post-translational modifications (PTMs) in regulating rice plant immunity. Through a study conducted by China's Zhejiang University researchers and colleagues, two proteins were found to be vital in the defense response. The researchers focused on the balance between two opposing PTMs, ubiquitination and SUMOylation, which control two proteins, OsEHD1 and OsEHD2, that act as negative regulators of rice defense against rice blast and bacterial blight. They found that the enzyme OsBBI1 tags OsEHD1 and OsEHD2 with a "destroy" signal (ubiquitin), marking them for degradation. Removing these two proteins led to improved rice plant immunity, confirming their function in weakening the defense response.