The association between ripening tomato fruit and the fungal pathogen, Botrytis cinerea, will be studied by collaborating laboratories, which combine complementary expertise in plant biology, biochemistry, biotechnology, carbohydrate chemistry and pathology, and thus provide the skills and resources for an efficient integrative systems biology approach. B. cinerea is an important plant pathogen; it infects all the aerial parts of plants but is notoriously aggressive on fruit, causing grey mold and rotting that lead to significant losses of palatable and ripe fresh fruit and vegetables. The research will investigate the resistance and susceptibility of tomato fruit to the fungus. During ripening, fruit undergo a crucial developmental transition from being unripe, green, and resistant to or tolerant of the fungus, to being ripe, red, and susceptible to damage by the fungus. The central hypothesis is that green fruit respond uniquely to B. cinerea, perhaps differently from red fruit and from the leaf and stem parts of the plant, and that this response changes in ripe fruit to encourage the fungus to break down the fruit and permit dispersal of mature seeds. Insights from this research will contribute to the development of methods for producing attractive, safe, healthy fruit and vegetables for human consumption. The objectives are to identify (1) responses activated in fruit by B. cinerea, (2) ripening processes that facilitate rotting of fruit by the fungus, and (3) functions of B. cinerea that are influenced by ripening. This research will include training programs for PhD, Masters and undergraduate student researchers and will involve collaboration with researchers in South Africa. In cooperation with a community science center in an important region of US agriculture, an interactive display will be developed to communicate directly to the public, including elementary school students, results of the research using agriculturally significant transgenic plants.
