Linda L Walling

University of California, Riverside | UCR · Department of Botany and Plant Sciences

Background: Homalodisca vitripennis Germar, the glassy-winged sharpshooter, is an invasive insect in California and a critical threat to agriculture through its transmission of the plant pathogen, Xylella fastidiosa. Quarantine, broad-spectrum insecticides, and biological control have been used for population management of H. vitripennis since its...

Background Homalodisca vitripennis Germar, the glassy-winged sharpshooter, is an invasive insect in California and a critical threat to agriculture through its transmission of the plant pathogen, Xylella fastidiosa. Quarantine, broad-spectrum insecticides, and biological control have been used for population management of H. vitripennis since its i...

The origin of the order Hemiptera can be traced to the late Permian Period more than 230 MYA, well before the origin of flowering plants 100 MY later in during the Cretaceous period. Hemipteran species consume their liquid diets using a sucking proboscis; for phytophagous hemipterans their mouthparts (stylets) are elegant structures that enable vor...

CRISPR/Cas9 technology enables the extension of genetic techniques into insect pests previously refractory to genetic analysis. We report the establishment of genetic analysis in the glassy-winged sharpshooter (GWSS), Homalodisca vitripennis, which is a significant leafhopper pest of agriculture in California. We use a novel and simple approach of...

Homalodisca vitripennis (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae), known as the glassy-winged sharpshooter, is a xylem feeding leafhopper and an important agricultural pest as a vector of Xylella fastidiosa, which causes Pierce’s disease in grapes and a variety of other scorch diseases. The current H. vitripennis reference genome from the Baylor College of Medicin...

Phloem-feeding insects cause massive losses in agriculture and horticulture. Host plant-mediated resistance to phloem-feeding insects is often mediated by changes in phloem composition to deter insect settling, feeding and viability. Here, we describe a mechanism of resistance to the phloem-feeding brown planthopper (BPH) associated with the fortif...

Homalodisca vitripennis (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae), known as the glassy-winged sharpshooter, is a xylem feeding leafhopper and an important agricultural pest as a vector of Xylella fastidiosa, which causes Pierce's disease in grapes and a variety of other scorch diseases. The current H. vitripennis reference genome from the Baylor College of Medicin...

Attack of plants by both viruses and their vectors is common in nature. Yet the dynamics of the plant‐virus‐vector tripartite system, in particular the effects of viral infection on plant‐insect interactions, have only begun to emerge in the last decade. Viruses can modulate the interactions between insect vectors and plants via the jasmonate, sali...

Gene drives based on CRISPR/Cas9 have the potential to reduce the enormous harm inflicted by crop pests and insect vectors of human disease, as well as to bolster valued species. In contrast with extensive empirical and theoretical studies in diploid organisms, little is known about CRISPR gene drive in haplodiploids, despite their immense global i...

Background: Chloroplasts are critical organelles that perceive and convey metabolic and stress signals to different cellular components, while remaining the seat of photosynthesis and a metabolic factory. The proteomes of intact leaves, chloroplasts, and suborganellar fractions of plastids have been evaluated in the model plant Arabidopsis, howeve...

Symbionts can regulate animal reproduction in multiple ways, but the underlying physiological and biochemical mechanisms remain largely unknown. The presence of multiple lineages of maternally inherited, intracellular symbionts (the primary and secondary symbionts) in terrestrial arthropods is widespread in nature. However, the biological, metaboli...

Background: Whiteflies are a threat to cassava (Manihot esculenta), an important staple food in many tropical/subtropical regions. Understanding the molecular mechanisms regulating cassava's responses against this pest is crucial for developing control strategies. Pathogenesis-related (PR) protein families are an integral part of plant immunity. W...

Background: Cassava whitefly outbreaks were initially reported in East and Central Africa cassava (Manihot esculenta Crantz) growing regions in the 1990's and have now spread to other geographical locations, becoming a global pest severely affecting farmers and smallholder income. Whiteflies impact plant yield via feeding and vectoring cassava mos...

Vectors often perform better on plants infected with pathogens, and this promotes the spread of pathogens. However, few studies have examined how plant defensive compounds mediate such mutualistic relationships. Although tobacco plants are relatively poor host plants for the whitefly Bemisia tabaci, tobacco's suitability to the whitefly was substan...

Plants immune surveillance systems depend on nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat receptors (NLRs). A subset of NLRs are nuclear-localized, including Rx1, which confers an extreme immunity against potato virus X (PVX). As with many NLRs, the downstream signaling partners of Rx1 are unknown. Townsendet al.identify a Golden-like transcription facto...

M18 aspartyl aminopeptidases (DAPs) are well characterized in microbes and animals with likely functions in peptide processing and vesicle trafficking. In contrast, there is a dearth of knowledge on plant aminopeptidases with a preference for proteins and peptides with N-terminal acidic residues. During evolution of the Plantae, there was an expans...

Roles of conserved residues in the Arabidopsis, human, bovine, P. aeruginosa, and Plasmodium DAPs. (DOCX)

Chlorophyte DAP genes and DAPs from other selected species. (PDF)

Musite-predicted Ser and Thr phosphorylation sites in plant DAP1 and DAP2 proteins. (DOCX)

Tomato plants express acidic leucine aminopeptidase (LAP-A) in response to various environmental stressors. LAP-A not only functions as a peptidase for diverse peptide substrates, but also displays chaperone activity. A K354E mutation has been shown to abolish the peptidase activity but to enhance the chaperone activity of LAP-A. To better understa...

Hemipteran insects are destructive pests worldwide and have multiple strategies for evading or coping with the host plant defenses. Innate immunity is a critical component of the plant defense against herbivory. In this chapter, we describe the status of our understanding of the three layers of defense including non-host resistance, pattern-trigger...

With the reduced costs, enhanced sensitivities and increased accessibility, the OMICs strategies of modern science are providing new insights and opportunities to understand the evolution and dynamics of plant-pest interactions. The deployment of high-throughput methods to study variation at the genome, transcriptome, proteome, and metabolome level...

Hemipteran and dipteran insects have behavioral, cellular and chemical strategies for evading or coping with the host plant defenses making these insects particularly destructive pests worldwide. A critical component of a host plant's defense to herbivory is innate immunity. Here we review the status of our understanding of the receptors that contr...

The acidic leucine aminopeptidase (LAP-A) from tomato is induced in response to wounding and insect feeding. Although LAP-A shows in vitro peptidase activity towards peptides and peptide analogs, it is not clear what kind of substrates LAP-A hydrolyzes in vivo . In the current study, the crystal structure of LAP-A was determined to 2.20 Å resolutio...

This chapter examines the activity, specificity and structural chemistry of Leucyl aminopeptidase (LAP). LAPs have been purified from barley and kidney bean seeds, and after overexpression in Escherichia coli. All plant LAPs are thermostable metallopeptidases with alkaline pH optima. Both the barley and the kidney bean seed LAPs are stimulated by M...

Potato leaves infected with Phytophthora infestans produced a serine protease inhibitor (PLPKI) with specificity for microbial proteases. Sequencing of the first twenty residues at the NH2-terminus of the mature PLPKI polypeptide demonstrated that PLPKI is a novel member of the potato protease inhibitor I family. PLPKI inhibited the activity of ext...

Wounding due to mechanical injury or insect feeding causes a wide array of damage to plant cells including cell disruption, desiccation, metabolite oxidation, and disruption of primary metabolism. In response, plants regulate a variety of genes and metabolic pathways to cope with injury. Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) is a model for wound signaling...

Plants and their herbivores have evolved complex relationships. The mechanics of feeding and oral secretions influence the activation and/or suppression of defense-signaling pathways in response to herbivory. The role of defense hormone jasmonic acid and wound-signaling modulator leucine aminopeptidase in activating tomato defenses that antagonize...

Vectors often perform better on plants infected with pathogens, and this promotes the spread of pathogens. However, few studies have examined how plant defensive compounds mediate such mutualistic relationships. Although tobacco plants are relatively poor host plants for the whitefly Bemisia tabaci, tobacco's suitability to the whitefly was substan...

High-quality RNA is important in studying gene expression. This report describes an improved method for isolating intact purified RNA from dehydrated organs of chili pepper plants. Common RNA extraction protocols have produced poor yields because dehydrated leaves accumulate polysaccharides and RNases. Our protocol is based on a guanidine thiocyana...

This chapter focuses on the linkages between the behavioral responses of phloem-feeding insects and the genetic mechanisms that are involved in host plant resistance against phloem-feeding insects. It summarizes plant-insect interactions that have used electropenetration graph (EPG) analyses to demonstrate phloem-localized insect resistance in host...

Some plant pathogens form obligate relationships with their insect vector and are vertically transmitted via eggs analogous to insect endosymbionts. Whether insect endosymbionts manipulate plant defenses to benefit their insect host remains unclear. The tomato psyllid, Bactericerca cockerelli (Sulc), vectors the endosymbiont "Candidatus Liberibacte...

Leucine aminopeptidases (LAPs) are present in animals, plants and microbes. In plants, there are two classes of LAPs. The neutral LAPs (LAP-N and its orthologs) are constitutively expressed and detected in all plants; while the stress-induced acidic LAPs (LAP-A) are expressed only in a subset of the Solanaceae. LAPs have a role in insect defense an...

The top 149 tomato transcripts expressed after tomato psyllid1st–2nd instar feeding. (XLS)

The top 149 tomato transcripts expressed after tomato psyllid 3rd–5th instar feeding. (XLS)

The top 149 tomato transcripts expressed after tomato psyllid adult feeding. (XLS)

Leucine aminopeptidases (LAPs) are present in animals, plants, and microbes. In plants, there are two classes of LAPs. The neutral LAPs (LAP-N and its orthologs) are constitutively expressed and detected in all plants, whereas the stress-induced acidic LAPs (LAP-A) are expressed only in a subset of the Solanaceae. LAPs have a role in insect defense...

The effects of cadmium (Cd) on aminopeptidase (AP) activities and Leucine-AP (LAP) expression were investigated in the roots of tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L., var Ibiza) plants. Three-week-old plants were grown for 10 days in the presence of 0.3-300 μM Cd and compared to control plants grown in the absence of Cd. AP activities were measured using...

The temporal and spatial expression of tomato wound- and defense-response genes to Bemisia tabaci biotype B (the silverleaf whitefly) and Trialeurodes vaporariorum (the greenhouse whitefly) feeding were characterized. Both species of whiteflies evoked similar changes in tomato gene expression. The levels of RNAs for the methyl jasmonic acid (MeJA)-...

The relative resistance of a plant to pathogens is determined by preformed, constitutive defenses, and the quality and diversity of the induced defenses deployed upon attack. Pathogens have evolved strategies to breach structural barriers and avoid or counter preformed and induced chemical defenses of their host plants. Plants have evolved sensitiv...

Heavy metals are known to generate reactive oxygen species that lead to the oxidation and fragmentation of proteins, which become toxic when accumulated in the cell. In this study, we investigated the role of the proteasome during cadmium stress in the leaves of Arabidopsis thaliana plants. Using biochemical and proteomics approaches, we present th...

Leucine aminopeptidase A (LapA) is a late wound-response gene of tomato (Solanum lycopersicum). To elucidate the role of LapA, transgenic plants that overexpressed or abolished LapA gene expression were used. The early wound-response gene RNA levels were similar in wild-type and Lap-silenced (LapA-SI), -antisense (LapA-AS), and -overexpressing (Lap...

Phytophages breach the integrity of plant tissues to recover nutrients from foliage, seeds, pollen, nectar, roots, or shoots. While many herbivores cause extensive damage, phloem-feeding insects, such as aphids and whiteflies, cause modest to barely perceptible damage, respectively. Phloem-feeding insects provide additional challenges to plants as...

The constitutive and wound-inducible leucine aminopeptidases (LAP-N and LAP-A, respectively) of tomato encode 60-kDa proteins with 5-kDa presequences that resemble chloroplast-targeting peptides. Cell fractionation studies and immunoblot analyses of chloroplast and total proteins have suggested a dual location of the mature LAP-A proteins in the cy...

The Mi-1.2 gene has been isolated from wild varieties of tomato, Solanum peruvianum (Mill), and incorporated into near isogenic commercial varieties of tomato, Solanum lycopersicon. Plants containing the gene confer resistance to tomato psyllid, Bactericerca cockerelli (Sulc), as well as species of aphids, whiteflies, and nematodes. Considering bia...

Phloem-feeding pests cause extensive crop damage throughout the world, yet little is understood about how plants perceive and defend themselves from these threats. The silverleaf whitefly (SLWF; Bemisia tabaci type B) is a good model for studying phloem-feeding insect-plant interactions, as SLWF nymphs cause little wounding and have a long, continu...

The basal defenses important in curtailing the development of the phloem-feeding silverleaf whitefly (Bemisia tabaci type B; SLWF) on Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) were investigated. Sentinel defense gene RNAs were monitored in SLWF-infested and control plants. Salicylic acid (SA)-responsive gene transcripts accumulated locally (PR1, BGL2, PR5...

Leucine aminopeptidases (LAPs) are metallopeptidases that cleave N-terminal residues from proteins and peptides. While hydrolyzing Leu substrates, LAPs often have a broader specificity. LAPs are members of the M1 or M17 peptidase families, and therefore the LAP nomenclature is complex. LAPs are often viewed as cell maintenance enzymes with critical...

The Mi-1.2 gene, identified from wild varieties of tomato, Solanum peruvianum (Mill) (Solanaceae), has been incorporated into near-isogenic commercial varieties of tomato and has been shown to confer resistance to three different species of phloem feeders: aphids, whiteflies, and nematodes. The results presented here show that plants bearing Mi-1.2...

Post-translational modifications are essential for a variety of functions, such as the translocation, activation, regulation, and, ultimately, degradation of proteins. The amino-terminal (N-terminal) region is a particularly active area for such alterations. Three types of reactions predominate: limited proteolysis to remove one or more amino acids...

Plants in the family Solanaceae possess numerous traits that are induced from damage from herbivores. Many of these also can be induced by exposing plants to the plant hormone jasmonic acid or its volatile ester methyl jasmonate. Datura wrightii (Solanaceae) is dimorphic for leaf trichome morphology in most southern California populations. Trichome...

Integration of the tools of genetics, genomics, and biochemistry has provided new approaches for identifying genes responding to herbivory. As a result, a picture of the complexity of plant-defense signaling to different herbivore feeding guilds is emerging. Plant responses to hemipteran insects have substantial overlap with responses mounted again...

Homologues of the floral meristem identity genes LEAFY (LFY) and APETALA1 (AP1) were isolated from the hybrid perennial tree crop 'Washington' navel orange (Citrus sinensis) and designated CsLFY and CsAP1, respectively. Citrus has an extended juvenile period unlike herbaceous plants and responds to different floral stimuli than herbaceous plants or...

TERMINAL FLOWER is a key regulator of floral timing in Arabidopsis and other herbaceous species. A homolog of this gene, CsTFL, was isolated from the hybrid perennial tree crop Washington navel orange (Citrus sinensis L. Osbeck). The deduced amino acid sequence of CsTFL was 65% identical to the Arabidopsis TFL1 protein. Wild-type Arabidopsis plants...

Tomatoes (Lycopersicon esculentum) express two forms of leucine aminopeptidase (LAP-A and LAP-N) and two LAP-like proteins. The relatedness of LAP-N and LAP-A was determined using affinity-purified antibodies to four LAP-A protein domains. Antibodies to epitopes in the most N-terminal region were able to discriminate between LAP-A and LAP-N, wherea...

The importance of two putative Zn2+-binding (Asp347, Glu429) and two catalytic (Arg431, Lys354) residues in the tomato leucine aminopeptidase (LAP-A) function was tested. The impact of substitutions at these positions, corresponding to the bovine LAP residues Asp255, Glu334, Arg336, and Lys262, was evaluated in His6-LAP-A fusion proteins expressed...

Summary • Changes are reported here in Phytophthora parasitica (root rot) infection of Lycopersicon esculentum (tomato) in response to elevated CO2 concentration. • Defense-related gene expression in tomato infected with P. parasitica was measured in plants grown at ambient (350 ppm) and elevated (700 ppm) CO2. • Tomato plants showed a degree of to...

Induced Resistance in Plants Against Insects and Diseases, Wageningen, The Netherlands, 26–28 April 2001.

Tomato plants constitutively express a neutral leucine aminopeptidase (LAP-N) and an acidic LAP (LAP-A) during floral development and in leaves in response to insect infestation, wounding, and Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato infection. To assess the physiological roles of LAP-A, a LapA-antisense construct (35S:asLapA1) was introduced into tomato. T...