Genomics of the grapevine - pathogen interactions: Botrytis cinerea virulence factors & molecular mechanisms of induced resistance

Molecular mechanisms of fungal infection and grapevine defense reactions remain largely unknown. Genomes of Botrytis cinerea and Vitis vinifera have been sequenced and the newly available genomic tools offer the opportunity to get for the first time an integrated view of the physiology of the interaction that is ongoing between this plant and one of its major microbial pathogen. We hypothesize that a comprehensive kinetic description of the transcriptome of both B. cinerea pathogen and of its plant host will answer important questions regarding fungal virulence factors and plant defense. The molecular physiology of the infection process will be investigated from both the plant and pathogen sides. Identical biological samples will be used for all the analyses and results will be compared and integrated. Altogether, the resulting data will provide the first integrated view on the physiology of grapevine infection by a biotroph and a necrotroph pathogen, and should provide new insights on the mechanisms involved in the infection process. A such approach has never been carried out before in grapevine.