Project description
Insight into plant responses against pathogens
Plants employ specific physical and other defences against pathogen invasion and disease. Understanding these processes is of paramount importance to create more resistant crops in agriculture. Funded by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the SC-Foxy project aims to generate a more representative model of plant-pathogen interaction using the plant Arabidopsis thaliana and a fungal species. The idea is to study the responses of individual plant cells to both harmful and helpful strains of the fungus using a new technique for cell labelling. Project findings will enhance our current understanding of plant immune responses and facilitate the development of novel interventions in agriculture.
Objective
Pathogen-caused diseases represent one of the biggest problems in agriculture. A detailed mechanistic understanding of plant defenses against pathogenic invasion and disease progression is therefore a vital research topic, forming the foundation for the creation of more resistant crop varieties. However, at present, most studies aimed at this utilize ‘omics’ approaches or mutant analyses, which lack resolution and only allow limited understanding of plant-pathogen interactions at the single-cell level. Thus, our current models of plant-pathogen interaction do not include strictly local or temporal responses. The aim of this proposal is to address this with a pathosystem consisting of the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana and strains of Fusarium oxysporum, a destructive fungal pathogen of several food crops. A unique near-native imaging setup, enabling the simultaneous study of growth and infection of plant and fungus with single-cell resolution, will be used. The work in this proposal will probe the responses of individual plant cells to both pathogenic and beneficial F. oxysporum strains, in a native tissue context from the onset of invasion to full disease development. This will generate novel insights into cellular mechanisms employed by plants to fight off pathogenic invaders, while accommodating beneficial endophytes. By using a novel in vivo cell-labeling technique, exploiting the fungal avirulence effector secretion system, a single-cell transcriptome atlas exclusively of cells undergoing acute colonization will be generated. Moreover, as root barriers represent a physical hindrance for pathogen invasion, mutants affected in physical defenses will be tested. Combined, this proposal will expand our current models of immune responses to include specific cells, regions or tissues, and temporal aspects with high resolution. Such knowledge is important to develop next-generation agricultural tools and will be applicable to combat current and arising diseases.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
This project's classification has been validated by the project's team.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
This project's classification has been validated by the project's team.
Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
-
HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
MAIN PROGRAMME
See all projects funded under this programme
Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
See all projects funded under this funding scheme
Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) HORIZON-MSCA-2022-PF-01
See all projects funded under this callCoordinator
Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
80539 MUNCHEN
Germany
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.