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Updated: Jul 17, 2026

Application of RNA Interference in the Pinewood Nematode, Bursaphelenchus xylophilus
Published on: March 9, 2022
RNAi from plants to nematodes
Godelieve Gheysen1, Bartel Vanholme
1Department of Molecular Biotechnology, Ghent University, Coupure links 653, 9000 Ghent, Belgium. Godelieve.Gheysen@UGent.be
Abstract:
Coincident with the award of the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 2006 to Fire and Mello for their discovery of RNAi, plant scientists have succeeded in using RNAi-based techniques to control nematodes, a hitherto unmanageable plant parasite. Recent work has demonstrated that the expression in a host plant of double-stranded RNA targeting housekeeping or parasitism genes in the root-knot nematode resulted in resistance to nematode infection.
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