Corresponding author: fengchen@henau.edu.cn (86-0371-56990337)

Fusarium crown rot (FCR) is one of the most serious underlying diseases to threaten wheat yield and quality recently. Here, we identified an antioxidant enzyme gene catalase (TaCAT) through genome wide association study (GWAS) and whole-exome sequencing (WES) in two nested bi-parental populations.

We verified the function of TaCAT regulating wheat FCR resistance by virus-induced gene silencing (VIGS), EMS mutants and overexpression lines.

Moreover, we screened a TaSnRK1α that interacted with TaCAT through phosphorylation in vitro and in vivo. Subsequently, we identified an FCR-resistance haplotype TaCAT214Ser/418Lys, and confirmed that Ser214Thr of TaCAT was a key phosphorylation site by TaSnRK1α.

We also found that TaSnRK1α improve more protein accumulation in TaCAT-R214Ser than TaCAT-S214Thr, possibly resulting in an enhanced FCR resistance in TaCAT-R wheat plants.

Furthermore, the function of TaSnRK1α regulating FCR resistance was verified in wheat EMS mutants and overexpression lines. Taken together, we proposed a TaSnRK1α-TaCAT model to mediate FCR resistance by scavenging the ROS in wheat plants.