The ability of parasitic plants to withdraw nutrients from their hosts depends on the formation of an infective structure known as the haustorium. How parasites regulate their haustoria numbers is poorly understood, and here, we uncovered that existing haustoria in the facultative parasitic plants Phtheirospermum japonicum and Parentucellia viscosa suppressed the formation of new haustoria located on distant roots. […]

Plant Physiology https://doi.org/10.1093/plphys/kiad343 Martina Leso, Anna Kokla, Ming Feng & Charles W Melnyk   The formation of the haustorium is common to all parasitic plants and requires a dedicated process of growth, attachment and tissue invasion. Such a process presumably involves cell wall modifications to allow cell division, cell expansion and the digestion of host […]

The availability of nutrients in the environment can have dramatic effects on plant parasitism, for instance, Striga infestations are reduced in nutrient rich soils. The molecular basis for this phenomenon is not well known so we decided to investigate this further with the Orobanchaceae family member Phtheirospermum japonicum. It’s a facultative parasite which infects Arabidopsis […]