Chloride salt enhances plant resistance against biotic stresses in plant

As sessile organisms, plants encounter abiotic and biotic stresses from time-to-time in the field. To gain further knowledge and to do better in protecting and taking use of natural genetic resources, the interaction between plant and stresses from its growth circumstance has always been a hot-spot of scientific research and agricultural breeding. In this study, we found that the abiotic treatment of chloride salt irrigation suppressed the accelerated cell death phenotype of ceramide kinase mutant acd5. And further tests showed chloride salt treatment was also capable to restrain cell death lesions caused by hemibiotrophic pathogen infection and enhanced plant resistance partially dependent on salicylic acid pathway. Besides, chloride salt irrigation greatly promoted plant defense against fungal pathogen infection and herbivorous insect attack. Thus, our collective data suggests abiotic treatment of chloride increases plant broad spectrum resistance to biotic challenges, but the underpinning molecular mechanism still needs further investigation, which provides new clues to explore the valuable natural resistance resources.