Nematicidal proteins

Plant husbandry – Process

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800301, 935 64, A01B 7900

Patent

active

060064706

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BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to the control of nematode pests.
There are nematode parasites of plants and animals, including humans. The plant parasites can cause significant economic losses in sub-tropical, tropical and temperate agriculture. Plant-parasitic nematodes are small (generally 100-300 .mu.m long but up to 4 mm long, and 15-35 .mu.m wide) worm-like animals which feed on root, stem or leaf tissues of living plants. Nematodes are present wherever plants are cultivated. Ectoparasitic nematodes, such as the dagger (Xiphinema and Longidorus spp.), stubby-root (Trichodorus and Paratrichodorus spp.) and spiral (Scutellonema and Helicotylenchus spp.) nematodes, live outside the plant and pierce the plant cells with their stylet in order to feed. Migratory endoparasitic nematodes, such as the lesion (Pratylenchus spp.), stem and bulb (Ditylenchus spp.) and burrowing (Radopholus spp.) nematodes, live and feed inside the plant, migrating through the plant tissues. Sedentary endoparasitic nematodes, such as the root-knot (Meloidogyne spp.), cyst (Globodera and Heterodera spp.), citrus (Tylenchulus spp.) and reniform (Rotylenchulus spp.) nematodes, live and feed inside the plant, inducing specialised fixed feeding sites called giant cells, syncytia or nurse cells in susceptible plants. Such fixed feeding sites serve as food transfer cells for the various developmental stages of the nematodes. Syncytia originate in the pericycle, endodermis or adjacent cortex.
Various methods have been used to control plant parasitic nematodes. They include quarantine measures, manipulation of planting and harvesting dates, improved fertilization and irrigation programmes that lessen plant stresses, crop rotation and fallowing, use of resistant and tolerant cultivars and rootstocks, organic soil amendments, and physical (eg solarization), biological and chemical control. Although quarantines are useful, especially when an infestation is first discovered, they are very expensive measures and usually cannot prevent the spread of nematodes. Furthermore, biological control is difficult to manage, and high quantitites and repeated additions of agents are required.
Today, control of plant-parasitic nematodes relies mainly on chemical control. Nematicides used commercially are generally either fumigants (eg halogenated aliphatic hydrocarbons and methyl isothiocyanate precursor compounds) or non-fumigants (eg organophosphates and oximecarbamates). However, the use of chemical nematicides is undesirable because these chemicals are highly toxic and therefore present a hazard to the user and to the environment
Thus, there is today a real need to have new, more effective, and safe means to control plant-parasitic nematodes.
Using the modern techniques of recombinant DNA and plant genetic engineering, genes encoding nematode control proteins may be cloned and introduced into cells of the appropriate crop plant, where their expression renders that plant inherently resistant to nematode attack. Genetic engineering overcomes the problem of reproductive barriers to genetic recombination.
WO 93/06710 (North Carolina State University) discloses an approach to imparting nematode resistance to plants which comprises transforming plants with a heterologous DNA construct consisting of a plant promoter, which is activated by a nematode attacking the plant, and a structural gene, which encodes a product which is toxic to the plant cells which form the feeding site of the nematode. Examples of products toxic to plant cells which are disclosed are nucleases, proteinases, toxins from plant pathogenic bacteria, lipases, membrane channel proteins and antibodies which bind to plant cell components. The disadvantage of this approach is that expression of the toxin gene must be restricted to the nematode feeding site in order to prevent death of plant cells in adjacent tissues. In practice this is difficult to achieve.
WO 92/04453 (The University of Leeds) discloses a method for conferring nematode resistance on plants by trans

REFERENCES:
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