Figure 1.
Phytochrome-interacting factor (PIF) proteins redundantly regulate plant defense response. (a) The disease phenotypes of pif mutant plants. The WT (Col-0) and pif plants were grown on soil for 28 days, under 12 h light/12 h dark conditions, and then inoculated with B. cinerea spores (5 × 105 spores/mL); representative plants were photographed at six days post-inoculation (dpi). The experiments were repeated three times, with similar results. (b) The expression of PIFs was downregulated upon Botrytis inoculation. (c) The relative biomass of Botrytis in pif plants. RNA was isolated from spray-inoculated plants at 0 and 4 dpi, and the relative β-tubulin gene transcripts were examined. Error bars indicate SD of three independent experiments. The different letters above columns indicate significant differences (one-way ANOVA; p < 0.05). (d) The relative expression of ERF1, ORA59, PDF1.2, and HEL in WT and pifq after Botrytis inoculation. (e) The basal expression of ERF1, ORA59, PDF1.2, and ERF104 in 14-day-old soil grown pif mutant under LD condition. For (d,e), error bars indicate SD of three independent experiments. Asterisks indicate Student’s t-test significant differences (* p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01).