The hypersensitive defence response is found in all higher plants and is characterized by a rapid cell death at the point of pathogen ingress. It is usually associated with pathogen resistance, though, in specific situations, it may have other consequences such as pathogen susceptibility, growth retardation and, over evolutionary timescales, speciation. Due to the potentially severe costs of inappropriate activation, plants employ multiple mechanisms to suppress inappropriate activation of HR and to constrain it after activation. The ubiquity of this response among higher plants despite its costs suggests that it is an extremely effective component of the plant immune system.
Keywords: hypersensitive response.
Published 2019. This Article is a U.S. Government Work and is in the Public Domain in the USA. Molecular Plant Pathology published by British Society for Plant Pathology and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.