Innate immunity signaling pathways in both animals and plants are regulated by mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) cascades. In a recent publication we show that MPK4 and its substrate MKS1 interact with WRKY33 in vivo, and that WRKY33 is released from complexes with MPK4 upon infection. Transcriptome analysis of a wrky33 loss-of-function mutant identified a subset of defense-related genes as putative targets of WRKY33. These genes include PAD3 and CYP71A13, which encode cytochrome P450 monoxygenases required for synthesis of the antimicrobial phytoalexin camalexin. Chromatin immunoprecipitation confirmed that WRKY33 bound the promoter of PAD3 when plants were inoculated with pathogens. Here we further discuss the involvement of two other targets of WRKY33, NUDT6 and ROF2 in defense responses against invading pathogens.
Keywords: Arabidopsis; MAPK cascade; defense response; target gene; transcription factor.