Poster: Proteomics

Abs # 970: Proteomic analysis of maize rachis tissue in Aspergillus flavus resistant inbreds

Presenter:	Pechanova, Olga , op2@ra.msstate.edu
Authors	Pechanova, Olga  (A)   Pechan, Tibor  (A)   Williams, Paul  (B)   Luthe, Dawn  (A)
Affiliations:	(A): Mississippi State University (B): USDA-ARS, Corn Host Plant resistance Unit, Mississippi State

Several maize inbred lines resistant to Aspergillus flavus infection and aflatoxin contamination have been developed by USDA-ARS scientists at Mississippi State University. Our goal is to identify proteins in these lines that may be involved in resistance to fungal infection by comparing proteins separated by 2-D gel electrophoresis (2-DE) from the rachis (cob) and pericarp tissues of resistant and susceptible inbred lines. These tissues were selected because studies with GFP-tagged A. flavus indicated that fungal growth was blocked in rachis of resistant lines. Pericarp is another type of maternal tissue that may be involved in controlling of fungal proliferation. Inbreds were tagged at silk emergence and rachis and pericarp samples were collected at various intervals during ear development. We performed the 2-D gel analysis from samples collected 21 days after silking from the resistant lines Mp313E, Mp420 and Mp715, a line with intermediate resistance Tx 601 and susceptible lines SC212M, Mp 339 and B73. Analysis of rachis and pericarp 2-D gels with PDQuest software (BioRad) revealed several hundreds of Coomassie blue-stained proteins in each genotypes. There were several proteins specific to resistant and susceptible lines .. MALDI-TOF MS will be used to identify the specific proteins that may be correlated with resistance and susceptibility to A. flavus.