A disguised plant immune receptor lures pathogen effector
1Crop Disease Resistance Team, Yazhouwan National Laboratory, Sanya, 572024 Hainan, China.
Cell Host & Microbe
|August 12, 2026
Abstract:
Plants use nucleotide-binding/leucine-rich-repeat receptors (NLRs) to detect rapidly evolving pathogen effectors. Gómez De La Cruz et al. reveal MLA3 recognizes an effector by structurally mimicking a host virulence target interface, rather than through the guard/decoy model or an NLR integrated domain, offering principles for rational NLR engineering toward broad-spectrum disease resistance.
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