Robustness and tunability of the plant immune system

Plants sense microbial molecules to trigger innate immunity for protection from pathogens. However, microbes have evolved broad virulence factors that interfere with plant immune components. Therefore, immune mechanisms must be robust to cope with microbial perturbations. In addition, since too much immune response is detrimental for plant fitness, plant immune responses need to be tuned. The scientists study how plant immune signaling networks achieve the properties robustness and tunability using molecular genetics, genomics and computational modeling.