A peptide from insects protects transgenic tobacco from a parasitic weed

Parasitic plants present some of the most intractable weed problems for agriculture in much of the world. Species of root parasites such as Orobanche can cause enormous yield losses, yet few control measures are effective and affordable. An ideal solution to this problem is the development of parasite-resistant crops, but this goal has been elusive for most susceptible crops. Here we report a mechanism for resistance to the parasitic angiosperm Orobanche based on expression of sarcotoxin IA in transgenic tobacco. Sarcotoxin IA is a 40-residue peptide with antibiotic activity, originally isolated from the fly, Sarcophaga peregrina. The sarcotoxin IA gene was fused to an Orobanche-inducible promoter, HMG2, which is induced locally in the host root at the point of contact with the parasite, and used to transform tobacco. The resulting transgenic plants accumulated more biomass than non-transformed plants in the presence of parasites. Furthermore, plants expressing sarcotoxin IA showed enhanced resistance to O. aegyptiaca as evidenced by abnormal parasite development and higher parasite mortality after attachment as compared to non-transformed plants. The transgenic plants were similar in appearance to non-transformed plants suggesting that sarcotoxin IA is not detrimental to the host.