Biology Department Seminar

Partners-in-infection: host proteins involved in genetic transformation of plant cells by Agrobacterium

Vitaly Citovsky
Department of Cell Biology, State University of New York, Stony Brook, NY, USA

To genetically transform plants, Agrobacterium transports its genetic material, a nucleic acid-protein complex, termed the T-complex, into the host cell nucleus and, once inside the nucleus, it must reach the host chromatin for subsequent integration. This extraordinary diversity of biological processes that Agrobacterium employs to genetically transform the host cells makes it a unique experimental system to study general features of transport of genetic material between microbes and eukaryotic cells as well as between different compartments of a eukaryotic cell.
Our data suggest that the invading T-complexes are is transported into the host cell nucleus and then are targeted to the site of integration in the plant chromatin by a host protein AtVIP1. Having reached the host cell chromatin, the T-complex must be uncoated of its protein components to allow T-DNA integration. We show that this uncoating likely occurs by proteasomal degradation via the SCF complex pathway.