Amazing stuff! There is much more than thorns to plant defenses!
"Dying [attacked] plants can protect their successors from the same fate
Plants might look like passive life forms, quietly enduring drought, disease or parasites. But they are actually great at fighting back. A new study reveals an intricate feedback system that allows cowpeas attacked by herbivores to protect future plants from the same fate.
Previous studies have documented how some plants ‘call for help’ when being eaten: When caterpillars start to chew on the leaves, they release a chemical into the air that attracts predators, like wasps, which then feed on the caterpillars. But scientists have now uncovered a more complex mechanism, one that triggers protective capabilities across plant generations.
“The major finding is that a mechanism under the soil can impact the response to predators,” ... “This has never been seen before.” ...
found that when attacked by insects called leafminers, cowpea plants—in addition to releasing an airborne chemical to attract wasps—also release chemicals called flavonoids into the soil from their roots. Those flavonoids, in turn, cultivate a particular community of soil bacteria, which influences the next plants to grow in that soil: They cause the new plants to trigger that airborne alarm system before they’re attacked, as a protective measure.
The finding can have direct implications for the development of green pest management ..."
From the highlights and abstract:
"Highlights
• Leaf herbivory leaves a persistent soil-borne defensive legacy
• Jasmonate-dependent flavonoids restructure the rhizosphere microbiome
• The rhizosphere microbiome acts as a soil-borne legacy for subsequent plants
• Soil-borne legacy reconfigures volatile emission and enhances parasitoid attraction
Summary
How organisms convert short-term stress into long-term defense is a key ecological question. Classic herbivore-induced plant volatiles recruit natural enemies but act briefly only in damaged tissues.
Here, we report that leaf herbivory establishes a persistent soil defensive legacy to help uninfested subsequent plants attract parasitoids.
During the conditioning phase, herbivory systemically activates jasmonate signaling, which reprograms root metabolism and promotes the exudation of specific flavonoids, notably daidzein and genistein.
These compounds selectively restructure the rhizosphere microbiome, enriching functionally specialized bacterial taxa that constitute the soil-borne legacy. During the feedback phase, these enriched rhizosphere bacteria, in turn, increase jasmonate signaling in succeeding plants, boosting emission of the key parasitoid-attracting volatile (Z)-3-hexenyl acetate in the absence of herbivory.
Together, our findings reveal plant-soil feedback as an active ecological process that extends the spatial and temporal reach of plant defenses, with broad implications for plant-enemy interactions and sustainable pest management."
Graphical abstract
Figure 1 Leaf herbivory attracts parasitoids via systemic jasmonate signaling-mediated plant-soil feedbacks
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