Abstract: The invention provides novel Ti-plasmid vectors for Agrobacterium-medicated plant cell transformation. Plamsids of the invention are constructed with a DNA sequence (ie., a negative selectable maker or a DNA sequence that inhibits DNA unwinding) flanking the T-DNA bordered gene of interest that reduces or eliminates the occurrence of transformants with vector read-through DNA sequence. The invention also provides methods of plant cell transformation utilizing these novel vectors.

Abstract: The invention comprises a method for the induction of pathogen resistance in plants characterized by transforming a plant with a polynucleotide sequence comprising a pathogen inducible promoter which regulates the expression of a plant signal transduction protein or a homologue thereof which when constitutively expressed gives rise to a hypersensitive response in plants. Alternatively, the invention comprises a method for the induction of pathogen resistance in plants characterized by transforming a plant with a polynucleotide sequence comprising a pathogen inducible promoter which regulates the expression of a compound which is able to alleviate the inhibitory effect of a protein on the signal transduction pathway leading to a hypersensitive response in plants.

Abstract: This invention describes pathogen-inducible promoters which normally drive expression of plant hexose oxidases, especially those which can be isolated from Helianthus annuus and Lactuca sativa, more specifically those promoters which naturally are the regulatory regions driving expression of the hexose oxidase MS59 and WL64, respectively. Also claimed are chimeric constructs where these pathogen-inducible promoters drive expression of antipathogenic proteins or of proteins which can elicit a hypersensitive response.