On alert for phytopathogenic attack: Novel oxidized oligosaccharides as natural plant immunity elicitors for plant protection

Plant diseases caused by phytopathogens pose high risks to agriculture and food security. Nowadays, plant protection from phytopathogens rely on antibiotics/fungicides, resulting in resistance and bioaccumulation of harmful chemicals. A sustainable and eco-friendly approach is using natural elicitors to trigger plant immunity to protect from pathogenic attack. This project aims to provide proof-of-principle for using oxidized oligosaccharides as elicitors. The oxidized oligosaccharides are produced from plant cell wall polysaccharides by phytopathogen-derived lytic polysaccharide monooxygenases. These enzymes play key roles during pathogenic infection, and thus their produced oxidized oligosaccharides are hypothesized to be diagnostic molecules triggering strong and effective plant immunity.