About the Cover
Cyst nematodes are highly specialized endoparasites of plants. In a compatible interaction, they induce metabolically active multinucleate feeding cells within the vascular cylinder of the host root. This feeding site is called a syncytium and is characterized by cell wall dissolution between an initially infected cell and its neighbors, which become incorporated during syncytium expansion. The cover shows a bright-field micrograph of a toluidine blue-stained longitudinal section through a syncytium 5 days after the Arabidopsis root had been inoculated with the cyst nematode Heterodera schachtii. On pages 793-808 of this issue, de Almeida Engler et al. show that syncytium development is strongly affected by cell cycle inhibitors that arrest plant DNA synthesis or mitosis. Furthermore, treating roots with inhibitors soon after nematode inoculation blocks nematode maturation. Together, these data suggest that syncytium development involves several cycles of plant DNA endoreduplication that bypass mitosis.
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Copyright © 2007 by the American Society of Plant Biologists
