Abstract: This disclosure provides for transgenic soybean plants expressing a soybean homolog of glycine-rich protein 7 (GRP7) and exhibiting improved innate immunity and methods of making such plants.

Abstract: This disclosure provides for compositions and methods to increase the innate immunity of soybean plants.

Abstract: The bacterial plant pathogen Pseudomonas syringae injects effector proteins into host cells via a type III protein secretion system to cause disease. The invention relates to the discovery that the type III effector HopU1 is a mono-ADP-ribosyltransferase (ADP-RT) and suppresses plant innate immunity. The HopU1 substrates in Arabidopsis thaliana extracts were RNA-binding proteins that possess RNA-recognition motifs (RRMs). A. thaliana knock-out lines defective in the glycine-rich RNA-binding protein AtGRP7, a HopU1 substrate, were more susceptible than wild type plants to P. syringae. The ADP-ribosylation of AtGRP7 by HopU1 required two arginines within the RRM. The invention provides novel methods for the modulation of the innate immune response of a plant to a biotic stress, including methods for enhancing or suppressing the innate immune response of the plant.

Abstract: The invention discloses a novel heat shock protein with high homology to chloroplast elongation factor EF-Tu. Also disclosed is a transgenic method for enhancing tolerance to heat and drought in female reproductive organs. It involves the temporal and spatial expression of novel heat shock EF-Tu in a plant organ or plant tissue. The invention also includes expression constructs, and methods for the production of crop plants with heritable phenotypes which are useful in breeding programs designed to increase heat and drought tolerance.