Role of Effectors in Plant–Pathogen Interactions

Plant kingdom consistently faces challenges in a biosphere that is under constant stress because of sessility. One of their distinctive traits, which helps them to survive stressful situations, is their defensive mechanism against diseases caused by microbes like fungi, bacteria, virus, or parasites, which enter via wound or broken tissues to reach cells easily. Diseases caused by plant pathogens are a threat to global food security. Plant immune receptors recognize pathogens through pathogenic effector molecules by interacting with them to induce defensive immune response. Analytical techniques, molecular docking methods, and bioinformatics tools are developed for analyzing the structure and function of effector proteins and their roles in virulence to gain a better understanding of the biological processes. Genomic studies, gene editing tools, and recombinant DNA technologies are being developed to generate transgenic plants with improved plant immunity, high resistance to diseases, and high yielding capacity. In this chapter, we provide a comprehensive understanding of how various effectors from microorganisms cause virulence during infection by entering plant cells, and how the plants’ defense system functions to ward off these effectors, as well as we briefed the concept of plant host–pathogen interactions.