Natural Products-Based Botanical Bactericides Discovery: Novel Abietic Acid Derivatives as Anti-Virulence Agents for Plant Disease Management
Pu‐Ying Qi, Taihong Zhang, Na Wang, Yu‐Mei Feng, Dan Zeng, Wu‐Bin Shao, Jiao Meng, Liwei Liu, Linhong Jin, Heng Zhang, Xiang Zhou, Song Yang
Abstract
The discovery of natural product-based pesticides is critical for agriculture. In this work, a series of novel tricyclic diterpenoid derivatives decorated with an amino alcohol moiety were elaborately prepared from natural abietic acid, and their antibacterial behavior was explored. Bioassay results indicated that compound C 2 exhibited the most promising bioactivity (EC 50 = 0.555 μg mL –1 ) against Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae ( Xoo ), about 73 times higher than the effect of commercial thiodiazole copper (TC). Results of in vivo bioassays showed that compound C 2 displayed significantly higher control of rice bacterial leaf blight (curative activity: 63.8%; protective activity: 58.4%) than TC (curative activity: 43.6%; protective activity: 40.8%), and their bioactivity could be improved maximally 16% by supplementing the auxiliaries. Antibacterial behavior suggested that compound C 2 could suppress various virulence factors. Overall, these findings suggested that new botanical bactericide candidates could control intractable plant bacterial diseases by suppressing virulence factors.