Sodium alginate potentiates antioxidant defense and PR proteins against early blight disease caused by Alternaria solani in Solanum lycopersicum Linn.

[摘要] The use of biopolymers as elicitors in controlling plant diseases is gaining momentum world-wide due to their eco-friendly and non-toxic nature. In the present study, we have used an algal biopolymer (sodium alginate) and tested its applicability as an elicitor in inducing resistance factors against Alternaria solani , which causes early blight disease in Solanum lycopersicum (tomato plant). We have pre-treated tomato plants with different concentrations of sodium alginate (0.2%, 0.4%, and 0.6%) before A . solani infection. We found that sodium alginate has effectively controlled the growth of A . solani . In addition, a significant increase in the expression levels of SOD was observed in response to pathogen infection. The increased protease inhibitors activity further suggest that sodium alginate restrict the development of A . solani infection symptoms in tomato leaves. This corroborates well with the cell death analysis wherein increased sodium alginate pre-treatment results in decreased cell death. Also, the expression profile analyses reveal the induction of genes only in sodium alginate-pretreated tomato leaves, which are implicated in plant defense mechanism. Taken together, our results suggest that sodium alginate can be used as an elicitor to induce resistance against A . solani in tomato plants.

[学科分类] 急救医学