Plant-pathogen interactions result in disease development in a susceptible host. Plants actively resist pathogens via a complex immune system comprising both surface-localized receptors that sense the extracellular space as well as intracellular receptors recognizing pathogen effectors. To date, the majority of cloned resistance genes encode intracellular nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat receptor proteins. Recent discoveries have revealed tandem kinase proteins (TKPs) as another important family of intracellular proteins involved in plant immune responses. Five TKP genes-barley Rpg1 and wheat WTK1 (Yr15), WTK2 (Sr60), WTK3 (Pm24), and WTK4-protect against devastating fungal diseases. Moreover, a large diversity and numerous putative TKPs exist across the plant kingdom. This review explores our current knowledge of TKPs and serves as a basis for future studies that aim to develop and exploit a deeper understanding of innate plant immunity receptor proteins.[Formula: see text] Copyright © 2021 The Author(s). This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license.
Keywords: Pm24; Rpg1; Sr60; WTK4; Yr15; fungus–plant interactions; intracellular perception proteins; plant defense response system; plant responses to pathogens; plant–pathogen interactions; resistance gene; wheat tandem kinase (WTK).