There exist more than 4500 plant species that live as parasites on other plants. Some of them cause remarkable damage to agriculture,even main to the complete failure of crops. Researchers working with Dr Markus Albert at the University of Tübingen's middle for Plant Molecular Biology (ZMBP) and collaborators from the Sainsbury Laboratory in Norwich (Professor Cyril Zipfel, Matthew Smoker) have been investigating the ways in which some species defend themselves against such parasites. They looked at various tomato cultivars that can prevent the dodder parasite from latching onto them. The scientists discovered a gene in the tomato that enabled the plant to recognize the dodder and trigger an innate ((adj.) natural, inborn, inherent; built-in) immune mechanism. Up to now, and that kind of defense mechanism had only been observed against microbial pathogens,insects and arachnids. The results suggest that it may be possible to better protect crops against plant parasites.
Source: phys.org