Figure 8

Effect of WRKY16 overexpression on manipulation of hormonal pathway responses. Expression level of defense-related target genes in roots of WRKY16-overexpressing line OE-E5 compared to the control prior to and 1 dpi with M. javanica. Total RNA was prepared from infected and noninfected WT control roots and infected and noninfected roots overexpressing SlWRKY16. The graph displays the mean and SEM representing the relative transcript levels of these genes in SlWRKY16-overexpressing roots (OE-E5) compared to control roots grown under identical conditions. The control expression level was set to zero. All target genes were normalized using the normalization factor, which was calculated as the geometric mean of the expression levels of tomato β-tubulin. Each reaction was performed in triplicate, and the results represent the mean of three independent biological replicates. The statistical significance of the differences between OE-E5 and control roots was assessed using the Tukey–Kramer multiple comparison test, and significant differences in expression (P < 0.05) are indicated by different letters above the bars.