Business Weekly - Cambridge, UK

Research funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council has led to a key discovery that if a particular gene is inactivated in the bacterium Erwinia carotovora, its ability to damage the plant and cause disease is severely impeded.

Erwinia carotovora can cause disease in a wide range of plants, including carrots, tomatoes and onions, but is best known in temperate regions for causing blackleg and soft rot in potatoes. Its success partly lies in its ability to produce enzymes that break down its host's cell walls, which in turn provide nutrients to the bacterium and so aid its survival and growth.

The Cambridge researchers, whose findings were recently published in the Journal of Bacteriology, discovered that if they inactivated a gene called relA, which helps the bacteria recognise when nutrients are running low, the bacteria's ability to export enzymes to break down the cell walls is also abolished.

Research leader Dr Martin Welch said: "By improving our understanding of how Erwinia carotovora rots the plant, we can reveal additional, possibly novel targets for the eventual development of anti-rot agents. We have also opened up the potential to develop pesticides."