DELLA and EDS1 Form a Feedback Regulatory Module to Fine-Tune Plant Growth-Defense Tradeoff in Arabidopsis.

ABSTRACT

Plants maintain a dynamic balance between growth and defense , and optimize allocation of resources for survival under constant pathogen infections. However, the underlying molecular regulatory mechanisms, especially in response to biotrophic bacterial infection, remain elusive. Here, we demonstrate that DELLA proteins and EDS1, an essential resistance regulator, form a central module modulating plant growth-defense tradeoffs via direct interaction. When infected by Pst DC3000, EDS1 rapidly promotes salicylic acid (SA) biosynthesis and resistance-related gene expression to prime defense response, while pathogen infection stabilizes DELLA proteins RGA and RGL3 to restrict growth in a partially EDS1-dependent manner, which facilitates plants to develop resistance to pathogens. However, the increasingly accumulated DELLAs interact with EDS1 to suppress SA overproduction and excessive resistance response. Taken together, our findings reveal a DELLA-EDS1-mediated feedback regulatory loop by which plants maintain the subtle balance between growth and defense to avoid excessive growth or defense in response to constant biotrophic pathogen attack.