Disease resistance of transgenic rice by overexpressing OsiWRKY gene

To derermine its biological function, we transformed OsiWRKY gene into rice. Southern blot and Northern blot analyses showed that the OsiWRKY gene had been integrated into rice genome and overexpressed in rice. Compared with nontransgenic rice, transgenic lines exhibited high resistance to Magnaporthe grisea and Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae. These results demonstrated the OsiWRKY gene might be a positive factor involved in regulating gene expression for disease resistance of rice.