Education
PhD Cornell University 2006
Hon. B.Arts&Sci. McMaster University 1998
Research
Pseudomonas syringae uses the syringe-like Type III Secretion System (T3SS) to inject Type III Secreted Effector (T3SE) proteins into the plant host. The primary role of T3SE proteins is believed to be the suppression of innate immunity. Recognition of effector proteins by the host Resistance (R) proteins results in the initiation of defense responses, including the hypersensitive response (HR). The pathogen can then evolve or acquire new T3SE proteins that evade the host defense response.
Given these dual roles of virulence and defense induction, T3SEs provide excellent tools to probe innate immunity in plants. My lab focuses on identifying new components in innate immunity and understanding their roles in defense, using a wide variety of experimental approaches.
Recent Publications
Zichu Yang, Tyler Helmann, Maёl Baudin, Karl J. Schreiber, Zhongmeng Bao, Paul Stodghill, Adam Deutschbauer, Jennifer D. Lewis and Bryan Swingle. 2025. “Genome-wide identification of novel flagellar motility genes in Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato DC3000.” Frontiers in Microbiology 16: 1535114. DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2025.1535114
Yukihisa Goto, Yasushiro Kadota, Malick Mbengue, Jennifer D. Lewis, Hidenori Matsui, Noriko Maki, Bruno Pok Man Ngou, Jan Sklenar, Paul Derbyshire, Arisa Shibata, Yasunori Ichihashi, David S. Guttman, Hirofumi Nakagami, Takamasa Suzuki, Frank L. H. Menke, Silke Robatzek, Darrell Desveaux, Cyril Zipfel and Ken Shirasu. 2024. “The leucine-rich repeat receptor kinase QSK1 is a novel regulator of PRR-RBOHD complex and is employed by the bacterial effector HopF2Pto to modulate plant immunity.” The Plant Cell 36(12): 4932-4951. DOI: 10.1093/plcell/koae267
Nathan Diplock, Maёl Baudin, Xincheng (Derek) Xiang, Lung-Yu Liang, Weiwan Dai, James M. Murphy, Isabelle S. Lucet, Jana A. Hassan and Jennifer D. Lewis. 2024. “Molecular dissection of the ZED1 pseudokinase enables expansion of HopZ1a recognition to Solanum lycopersicum ZAR1.” Plant Physiology 196(1): 651-666. DOI: 10.1093/plphys/kiae268
Jana A. Hassan, Nathan Diplock, Ilea J. Chau-Ly, Jamie Calma, Elizabeth Boville, Steven Yee, Taylor M. Harris and Jennifer D. Lewis. 2024. “Solanum pimpinellifolium exhibits complex genetic resistance to Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato.” Frontiers in Plant Science 15 DOI: 10.3389/fpls.2024.1416078
Nathan Diplock, Maёl Baudin, Leslie Harden, Christopher J. Silva, Melissa L. Erickson-Beltran, Jana A. Hassan and Jennifer D. Lewis. 2023. “Utilizing Natural Diversity of Kinases to Rationally Engineer Interactions with the Angiosperm Immune Receptor ZAR1.” Plant, Cell & Environment 46(7): 2238-2254. DOI: 10.1111/pce.14603
Julien S. Luneau, Maёl Baudin, Thomas Quirroz Monnens, Sébastien Carrère, Olivier Bouchez, Marie-Françoise Jardinaud, Carine Gris, Jonas François, Jayashree Ray, Babil Torralba, Matthieu Arlat, Jennifer D. Lewis, Emmanuelle Lauber, Adam M. Deutschbauer, Laurent D. Noёl and Alice Boulanger. 2022. “Genome-wide identification of fitness determinants in the Xanthomonas campestris bacterial pathogen during early stages of plant infection.” New Phytologist 236: 235-248. DOI: 10.1111/nph.18313
Jennifer D. Lewis, Michael Knoblauch and Robert Turgeon. 2022. “The phloem as an arena for plant pathogens.” Annual Review of Phytopathology 60: 77-96. DOI: 10.1146/annurev-phyto-020620-100946
Karl J. Schreiber, Ilea Chau-Ly and Jennifer D. Lewis. 2021. “What the wild things do: Mechanisms of plant host manipulation by bacterial type III-secreted effector proteins.” Microorganisms 9: 1029 DOI: 10.3390/microorganisms9051029
Karl J. Schreiber and Jennifer D. Lewis. 2021. “Identification of a putative DNA-binding protein in Arabidopsis that acts as a susceptibility hub and interacts with multiple Pseudomonas syringae effectors.” Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions 34(4): 410-425. DOI: 10.1094/MPMI-10-20-0291-R
Karl J. Schreiber, Jana A. Hassan and Jennifer D. Lewis. 2021. “Arabidopsis Abscisic Acid Repressor 1 (ABR1) is a susceptibility hub that interacts with multiple Pseudomonas syringae effectors.” Plant Journal 105(5): 1274-1291. DOI: 10.1111/tpj.15110.
Maёl Baudin, Eliza C. Martin, Chodon Sass, Jana A. Hassan, Claire Bendix, Rolin Sauceda, Nathan Diplock, Chelsea D. Specht, Andrei J. Petrescu and Jennifer D. Lewis. 2021. “A natural diversity screen in Arabidopsis thaliana reveals determinants for HopZ1a recognition in the ZAR1-ZED1 immune complex.” Plant, Cell & Environment 44(2): 629-644. DOI: 10.1111/pce.13927.
Bálint Csörgő, Lina M. León, Ilea J. Chau-Ly, Alejandro Vasquez-Rifo, Joel D. Berry, Caroline Mahendra, Emily D. Crawford, Jennifer D. Lewis, Joseph Bondy-Denomy. 2020. “A minimal CRISPR-Cas3 system for genome engineering.” Nature Methods 17: 1183-1190. DOI: 10.1038/s41592-020-00980-w.
Jana A. Hassan, Ilea J. Chau-Ly and Jennifer D. Lewis. (2020) “High-throughput identification of resistance to Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato in tomato using seedling flood assay.” Journal of Visualized Experiments 157: e60805.
Yuan Chen, Claire Bendix and Jennifer D. Lewis. (2020) “Comparative genomics screen identifies microbe-associated molecular patterns from Candidatus Liberibacter sp. that elicit immune responses in plants”. Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions 33: 539-552.
Maёl Baudin, Karl J. Schreiber*, Eliza C. Martin*, Andrei J. Petrescu and Jennifer D. Lewis. (2020) "Structure-function analysis of the immune receptor ZAR1 reveals key molecular interactions for activity." Plant Journal 101: 352-370. *co-second authors
Karl J. Schreiber and Jennifer D. Lewis. (2019) “Protein acetylation in pathogen virulence and host defense: In vitro detection of protein acetylation by radiolabeled acetyl Coenzyme A.” Methods in Molecular Biology Plant Innate Immunity 1991: 23-32.
Jana A. Hassan, Roberto de la Torre-Roche, Jason C. White, and Jennifer D. Lewis. (2018) “Soil mixture composition alters Arabidopsis susceptibility to Pseudomonas syringae infection.” Plant Direct 2(2): e00044. DOI: 10.1002/pld3.44.
Claire Bendix and Jennifer D. Lewis. (2018) “The enemy within: phloem-limited pathogens.” Molecular Plant Pathology 19(1): 238-254. DOI: 10.1111/mpp.12526
Yunchen Gong, Darrell Desveaux, David S. Guttman, and Jennifer D. Lewis. (2017) A practical guide to Quantitative Interactor Screening with next-generation Sequencing (QIS-Seq). Methods in Molecular Biology Biological Networks and Pathway Analysis 1613: 1-20.
Maёl Baudin, Jana A. Hassan, Karl J. Schreiber, and Jennifer D. Lewis. (2017) “Analysis of the ZAR1 immune complex reveals determinants for immunity and molecular interactions.” Plant Physiology 174(4): 2038-2053.
Jana A. Hassan, Yanming Jane Zhou, and Jennifer D. Lewis. (2017) “A rapid seedling resistance assay identifies wild tomato lines that are resistant to Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato race 1.” Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions 30(9): 701-709.
Karl J. Schreiber*, Maёl Baudin*, Jana A. Hassan, and Jennifer D. Lewis. (2016) Die Another Day: molecular mechanisms of effector-triggered immunity elicited by type III secreted effector proteins. Seminars in Cell and Developmental Biology 56: 124-133. *co-first authors DOI: 10.1016/j.semcdb.2016.05.001.
Jennifer D. Lewis, Mike Wilton, G. Adam Mott, Wenwan Lu, Jana A. Hassan, David S. Guttman and Darrell Desveaux. (2014) Immunomodulation by the Pseudomonas syringae HopZ type III effector family in Arabidopsis. PLoS One 9(12): e116152.
Jennifer D. Lewis, Timothy Lo, Patrick Bastedo, David S. Guttman and Darrell Desveaux. (2014) The rise of the undead: pseudokinases as mediators of effector-triggered immunity. Plant Signaling & Behavior 8(12): e27563.
Jennifer D. Lewis, Amy Huei-Yi Lee, Jana A. Hassan, Janet Wan, Brenden Hurley, Jacquelyn R. Jhingree, Pauline W. Wang, Timothy Lo, Ji-Young Youn, David S. Guttman and Darrell Desveaux. (2013) “The Arabidopsis ZED1 pseudokinase is required for ZAR1-mediated immunity induced by the Pseudomonas syringae type III effector HopZ1a.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 110(46): 18722-18727.
Amy Huei-Yi Lee, Brenden Hurley, Corinna Felsensteiner, Carmen Yea, Wenzislava Ckurshumova, Verena Bartetzko, Pauline W. Wang, Van Quach, Jennifer D. Lewis, Yulu C. Liu, Frederik Börnke, Stephane Angers, Andrew Wilde, David S. Guttman and Darrell Desveaux. (2012) “A bacterial acetyltransferase destroys plant microtubule networks and blocks secretion.” PLoS Pathogens 8(2): e1002523.
Jennifer D. Lewis, Janet Wan, Rachel Ford, Yunchen Gong, Pauline Fung, Pauline Wang, David S. Guttman and Darrell Desveaux. (2012) “Quantitative Interactor Screening with next-generation Sequencing (QIS-Seq) identifies Arabidopsis thaliana MLO2 as a target of the Pseudomonas syringae type III effector HopZ2.” BMC Genomics 13: 8.
Jennifer D. Lewis, Amy Huei-Yi Lee, Wenbo Ma, Huanbin Zhou, David S. Guttman and Darrell Desveaux. (2011) “The YopJ superfamily of type III effectors in plant-associated bacteria.” Molecular Plant Pathology 12(9): 928-937.
Jennifer D. Lewis, Ronald Wu, David S. Guttman and Darrell Desveaux. (2010) “Allele-specific virulence attenuation of the Pseudomonas syringae HopZ1a type III effector via the Arabidopsis ZAR1 resistance protein.” PloS Genetics 6(4): e1000894.
Jennifer D. Lewis, David S. Guttman and Darrell Desveaux. (2009) “The targeting of plant cellular systems by injected type III effectors.” Seminars in Cell and Developmental Biology 20(9): 1055-1063.
Jennifer D. Lewis, Karl Schreiber and Darrell Desveaux. (2009) “The needle and the damage done: type III effectors and the plant immune response.” In Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions, edited by K. Bouarab, N. Brisson and F. Daayf. Oxon: CAB International, p. 179-210.
Jennifer D. Lewis, Wasan Abada, Wenbo B. Ma, David S. Guttman and Darrell Desveaux. (2008) “The HopZ family of Pseudomonas syringae type III effectors require myristoylation for virulence and avirulence functions in Arabidopsis thaliana.” Journal of Bacteriology 190(8): 2880-2891.
