Combining subproteome enrichment and Rubisco depletion enables identification of low abundance proteins differentially regulated during plant defense.

Transgenic Arabidopsis conditionally expressing the bacterial avrRpm1 type III effector under the control of a dexamethasone-responsive promoter were used for proteomics studies. This model system permits study of an individual effector without interference from additional bacterial components. Coupling of different prefractionation approaches to high resolution 2-DE facilitated the discovery of low abundance proteins - enabling the identification of proteins that have escaped detection in similar experiments. A total of 34 differentially regulated protein spots were identified. Four of these (a remorin, a protein phosphatase 2C (PP2C), an RNA-binding protein, and a C2-domain-containing protein) are potentially early signaling components in the interaction between AvrRpm1 and the cognate disease resistance gene product, resistance to Pseudomonas syringae pv. maculicola 1 (RPM1). For the remorin and RNA-binding protein, involvement of PTM and post-transcriptional regulation are implicated, respectively.