Figure 8.

Effects of CabZIP23–CabZIP63 interaction on pepper immunity and thermotolerance. (a) HR mimicked cell death displayed by trypan staining, H₂O₂ accumulation displayed by DAB staining, and the upregulation of immunity related genes by the transient overexpression of CabZIP63 was significantly reduced by CabZIP23 silencing. (b) The application of excess CabZIP23 promoted the binding of CabZIP63 to the promoters of the tested immunity related genes, including CaNPR1 and CaPR1 but not CaHSP24, by an electrophoresis mobility shift assay (EMSA). (c) By ChIP-qPCR, CabZIP23 silencing reduced the binding of CabZIP63 to G-box, G-box1 and G-box2 of CaPR1 and CaNPR1, but did not affect the binding of CabZIP23 to the promoter of CaHSP24. (d) By qRT-PCR, the upregulation of CaPR1, CaNPR1 and CaDEF1 by the transient overexpression of CabZIP63 was reduced by CabZIP23 silencing, but the regulation of CaHSP24 by CabZIP63 was not affected by CabZIP23 silencing. In (c,d), the values are the means ± standard deviation from four biological replicates. Statistical analysis was performed by Fisher’s protected LSD test; different capital letters indicate significant difference at p < 0.01.