A Stress Response Kinase Cascade Is Conserved in Arabidopsis and Modulated by a Parasite Effector

We report that a novel Arabidopsis thaliana kinase cascade shows telltale similarities to the kinase cascades of oxidative stress response kinases (OSRKs) from humans and animals. A previously uncharacterized A. thaliana OSRK-like serine/threonine protein kinase (AtOSRK1) physically interacts with the kinase "With No Lysine" Kinase 5 (WNK5) and the plasma membrane-bound SNARE protein AtSYP132. The physical interaction between AtOSRK1 and AtWNK5 is governed by conserved domains also found in animal proteins; however, in all plants assayed, one of the interaction domains is found in the opposite kinase when compared with human/animal counterparts. We show that AtOSRK1 and AtWNK5 are members of a kinase cascade in which AtWNK5 phosphorylates and activates AtOSRK1, and both kinases then phosphorylate syntaxin AtSYP132. Homologous human/animal proteins have been shown to function in a strikingly similar fashion in stress responses and are involved in known inherited hypertensive disease states. We show that a novel effector protein (Hs28B03) of the plant-parasitic cyst nematode Heterodera schachtii specifically targets AtOSRK1 and interferes with the A. thaliana kinase cascade, resulting in a suppression of the phosphorylation of AtSYP132. A. thaliana lines constitutively expressing the Hs28B03 coding sequence showed elevated susceptibility to the cyst nematode while also exhibiting a larger size, suggesting suppressed defense in favor of vegetative growth. These findings document a functional A. thaliana protein kinase cascade that is structurally and functionally conserved in plants and humans/animals. Furthermore, the manipulation of this kinase cascade by a parasite effector revealed a novel mechanism of parasitism influencing growth-defense tradeoffs. [Formula: see text] Copyright © 2026 The Author(s). This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license.