A pals-25 gain-of-function allele triggers systemic resistance against natural pathogens of C. elegans

Abstract

Regulation of immunity throughout an organism is critical for host defense. Previous studies in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans have described an “ON/OFF” immune switch comprised of the antagonistic paralogs PALS-25 and PALS-22, which regulate resistance against intestinal and epidermal pathogens. Here, we identify and characterize a PALS-25 gain-of-function mutant protein with a premature stop (Q293*), which we find is freed from physical repression by its negative regulator, the PALS-22 protein. PALS-25(Q293*) activates two related gene expression programs, the Oomycete Recognition Response (ORR) against natural pathogens of the epidermis, and the Intracellular Pathogen Response (IPR) against natural intracellular pathogens of the intestine. A subset of ORR/IPR genes is upregulated in pals-25(Q293*) mutants, and they are resistant to oomycete infection in the epidermis, and microsporidia and virus infection in the intestine, but without compromising growth. Surprisingly, we find that activation of PALS-25 seems to primarily stimulate the downstream bZIP transcription factor ZIP-1 in the epidermis, with upregulation of gene expression in both the epidermis and in the intestine. Interestingly, we find that PALS-22/25-regulated epidermal-to-intestinal signaling promotes resistance to the N. parisii intestinal pathogen, demonstrating cross-tissue protective immune induction from one epithelial tissue to another in C. elegans.

Author summary

Multicellular organisms need to monitor the health and function of multiple tissues simultaneously to respond appropriately to pathogen infection. Here, we study an ON/OFF switch in the roundworm C. elegans that controls immune responses to diverse natural pathogens of the skin and gut. We show a physical association between the ‘ON switch’ protein PALS-25 and the ‘OFF switch’ protein PALS-22, and that this association is disrupted in a mutant, activated form of PALS-25. When either PALS-22 is lost, or PALS-25 is activated, a downstream immune regulator ZIP-1 is activated more prominently in the skin than in the gut. Excitingly, our findings show that skin-specific loss of PALS-22 or skin-specific activation of PALS-25 can induce immune responses in the worm gut. These findings highlight the coordination of immune responses across different tissues that are commonly infected by microbial pathogens.