Towards Plantibody-Mediated Resistance Against Nematodes

The lack of available resistance genes severely hampers the introduction of durable disease resistance in plants. Therefore we explored the feasibility to obtain resistance by the expression in plants of monoclonal antibodies. The rational behind this idea is that by binding to its antigen a monoclonal antibody is capable to inactivate the biological activity of that antigen. As a model system we have chosen the interaction between potato and potato cyst nematodes while saliva proteins of nematodes served as antigen. These proteins are thought to play an important role in this interaction. Inhibition of the biological activity of these proteins might interupt the interaction which results in resistance.