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IMAGE: Young oat seedling roots glow under UV due to the accumulation of the antimicrobial triterpene avenacins. Oats naturally produce avenacins exclusively within the root tip epidermal cells, which protects them. view more
Credit: Image supplied by researchers in the Osbourn laboratory at the John Innes Centre
Researchers have traced the remaining last steps of the biological pathway that gives oats resistance to the deadly crop disease take-all.
The discovery creates opportunities for new ways of defending wheat and other cereals against the soil-borne root disease.
The research team have already taken the first step in this aim by successfully reconstituting the self-defence system in the model plant Nicotiana benthamiana.