LIFE SCIENCE

Detailed explanation-1: -Agrobacterium tumefaciens is a pathogenic bacterium that causes crown gall disease, a plant tumor affecting a wide range of plant species. Crown galls develop upon transfer of a portion of the tumor-inducing (Ti) plasmid, the transfer-DNA (T-DNA), into the genome of the bacterium’s plant hosts (Chilton et al., 1980).

Detailed explanation-2: -Galls (from the Latin galla, ‘oak-apple’) or cecidia (from the Greek kēkidion, anything gushing out) are a kind of swelling growth on the external tissues of plants, fungi, or animals. Plant galls are abnormal outgrowths of plant tissues, similar to benign tumors or warts in animals.

Detailed explanation-3: -Agrobacterium tumefaciens causes crown gall disease on a wide range of host species by transferring and integrating a part of its own DNA, the T-DNA, into the plant genome (Chilton et al., 1977). This unique mode of action has also made the bacterium an important tool in plant breeding.