"Proposed guidelines for a unified nomenclature and phylogenetic analysis of type III Hop effector protein in the plant pathogen Pseudomonas syringae."

Molec. Plant-Microbe Interact

Lindeberg, M, J Stavrinides, JH Chang, JR Alfano, A Collmer, JL Dangl, JT Greenberg, JW Mansfield and DS Guttman

Summary "Pathovars of Pseudomonas syringae interact with their planthosts via the action of Hrp outer protein (Hop) effectorproteins, injected into plant cells by the type III secretionsystem (TTSS). Recent availability of complete genome sequencesfor a number of P. syringae pathovars has led to asignificant increase in the rate of effector discovery. However,lack of a systematic nomenclature has resulted inmultiple names being assigned to the same Hop, unrelatedHops designated by the same alphabetic character, andfailure of name choices to reflect consistent standards ofexperimental confirmation or phylogenetic relatedness.Therefore, specific experimental and bioinformatic criteriaare proposed for proteins to be designated as Hops. A genericHop name structure, HopXY#pv strain, also is proposed,wherein family membership is indicated by the alphabeticcharacters, subgroup membership numerically, and sourcepathovar and strain in subscript. Guidelines are providedfor phylogenetic characterization and name selection forHops that are novel, related to previously characterizedHops, chimeras, pseudogenes, truncations, or nonexpressedalleles. Phylogenetic analyses of previously characterizedHops are described, the results of which have been used toguide their integration into the proposed nomenclature."