Université Laval
Ph.D. candidate
Supervisor: Edel Pérez-López
Start: 2025-04-01
End: 2029-05-01

Project

Kinases and their role in Plasmodiophora brassicae disease progression
The Canola clubroot disease, caused by Plasmodiophora brassicae, is one of the biggest threats to Canadian canola crops. This lack of information makes it challenging for breeders to develop stable clubroot-resistant canola varieties. Different classes of kinases have been identified as playing key roles in inducing immune responses during plant-pathogen interactions. A genome-wide screening performed by Edelab revealed that the clubroot pathogen could secrete 27 putative kinases. However, there is very little information about the role of P. brassicae secreted kinases during pathogen colonization and disease progression. The main objective of this project is to characterize the role of clubroot pathogen kinases in disease progression and resistance. To address this, Edelab has produced Arabidopsis thaliana transgenic lines that overexpress different P. brassicae kinases. The PhD student will phenotype and characterize the resistance, tolerance, or susceptibility levels of these lines under P. brassicae infection, study the interaction between the kinases and plant proteins, and analyze the phosphoproteome of the transgenic lines compared with the wild type.