Koichi Sugimoto1,2, Kenji Matsui2, Yoko Iijima3, Yoshihiko Akakabe2, Shoko Muramoto2, Rika Ozawa1, Masayoshi Uefune1, Ryosuke Sasaki3, Kabir Md Alamgir4, Shota Akitake2, Tatsunori Nobuke2, Ivan Gális4, Koh Aoki3, Daisuke Shibata3, Junji Takabayashi1
1Center for Ecological Research, Kyoto University, Otsu, Shiga 520-2113, Japan
2Graduate School of Medicine (Faculty of Agriculture), Yamaguchi University, Yoshida 1677-1, Yamaguchi 753-8515, Japan;
3Kazusa DNA Research Institute, Kisarazu, Chiba 292-0818, Japan; and
4Institute of Plant Science and Resources, Okayama University, Kurashiki, Okayama 710-0046, Japan
Tóm tắt
Significance
Plants receive volatile compounds emitted by neighboring plants that are infested by herbivores, and consequently the receiver plants begin to defend against forthcoming herbivory. To date, how plants receive volatiles and, consequently, how they fortify their defenses, is largely unknown. We found that tomato plants absorbed the airborne green leaf alcohol (
Z
)-3-hexenol emitted by neighboring conspecific plants under attack by herbivores and subsequently converted the alcohol to a glycoside. The glycoside suppressed growth and survival rates of cutworms. The accumulation of glycoside in the receiver plants explained the defense acquired via “smelling” their neighbors. This study showed that the processing of a volatile compound is a mechanism of volatile reception in tomato plants.
