Bacteria and Plants Fight Alike – Life Sciences | Weizmann Wonder Wander

A brown blotch on a plant leaf may be a sign that the plant’s defenses are hard at work: When a plant is infected by a virus, fungus or bacterium, its immune response keeps the disease from spreading by killing the infected cell, as well as a few surrounding ones. A new study at the Weizmann Institute of Science points to the evolutionary origins of this plant immune mechanism. The study may help explain how major plant defenses work and how they may one day be strengthened to increase resilience against plant diseases that each year cause billions of dollars of crop losses…