BACKGROUND
"candidatus phytoplasma aurantifolia" is an obligate biotrophic plant pathogen that causes witches' broom disease in mexican lime trees .
this is a devastating disease that results in significant economic losses  <cit> .
phytoplasmas are prokaryotes that inhabit the phloem and are transmitted by phloem-sucking insects  <cit> .
it has been demonstrated that "ca.
phytoplasma aurantifolia" is transmitted by the leafhopper hishimonus phycitis   <cit> .
the mechanisms that regulate the distribution of phytoplasmas in the host tissue is still widely unknown.
at the tissue level, phytoplasma infection can cause anatomical aberrations such as extensive necrosis the phloem and phloem tissue proliferation, which results in swollen veins  <cit> .
reduced stomatal conductance has also been observed, together with impaired photosynthesis  <cit> .
the genomes of the phytoplasmas are extremely reduced and many genes that encode components of essential metabolic pathways in other organisms are missing.
it is likely phytoplasmas are unable to synthesize nucleotides and need to import them from the host plant.
important genes encode for enzymes involved in the biosynthesis of amino acids and fatty acids are also missing.
in addition, because phytoplasmas are the only known organisms without an atp-synthase, they probably need to import atp from the environment as well  <cit> .
this highly specialised nutritional requirements, which typifies biotrophic plant pathogens such as phytoplasmas, probably involves the strict control of host cell metabolism which is diverted to maintain a suitable environment for the pathogen  <cit> .
the molecular details of the infection process are largely unknown.
initial details were obtained from studies of phytoplasma/plant interactions with respect to polyphenol production and the transport of sugar and amino acid and comprehensive differences in gene expression have reported mainly in the experimental host plant periwinkle   <cit> .
however, molecular data from the direct investigation of compatible interactions in cultivated mexican lime tree genotypes are scarce, and witches' broom disease has received little attention as compared with diseases carried by other phytoplasma pathogens, such as aster yellows phytoplasma  <cit> .
in this study, we applied a cdna- amplified fragment length polymorphism  approach to identify genes that may be expressed differentially in mexican lime trees infected with "ca.
phytoplasma aurantifolia".
understanding the basis of susceptibility to the pathogen will assist greatly in the development of new control strategies and the identification of pathogen and host factors that are required for disease progression.
RESULTS
five months after grafting healthy mexican lime trees, plants developed the typical symptoms of witches' broom .
the results of nested pcr further confirmed the incidence of phytoplasma infection in grafted plants .
analysis with iphyclassifier revealed that the virtual restriction fragment length polymorphism  pattern that was derived from the phytoplasma  <dig> s rdna fragment amplified from the diseased specimens was most similar to the reference pattern of the 16sr group ii, subgroup b phytoplasma , with a pattern similarity coefficient of  <dig> .
therefore, the phytoplasma under study was a variant of 16srii-b and related to "ca.
phytoplasma aurantifolia".
cdna-aflp analysis
for each of the  <dig> primer combinations, 40- <dig> different transcript derived fragments , which ranged from  <dig> to  <dig> bp, were visualized as bands .
analysis of the expression profiles of the infected and noninfected samples between replicates revealed  <dig> differentially expressed tdfs  that showed the same pattern in all replicates.
fifty-one of these de-tdfs were isolated and sequenced.
the remaining four de-tdfs could not be cloned and were excluded from analysis.
out of the  <dig> sequenced de-tdfs,  <dig> showed similarity to known gene sequences in databases , whereas  <dig> de-tdfs did not show homology to any known nucleotide or amino acid sequences.
all  <dig> tdfs sequences were submitted to the ncbi database with accession numbers assigned and reported in table  <dig>
tdfs were cloned and sequenced from one health  or infected  plant.
gene ontology analysis of mexican lime tree transcripts modulated by witches broom infection
each of the  <dig> sequenced transcript was annotated functionally through careful analysis of the scientific literature and the gene ontology databases.
out of  <dig> sequenced de-tdfs,  <dig>  could be assigned to one of the following functional groups: stress response/defense , cell metabolism , protein synthesis/destination , signal transduction , transporter , transcription , cytoskeleton  and unknown function .
the molecular function of each individual protein is given in table  <dig>  the stress response/defence group contained  <dig> % of the de-tdfs and constituted the largest functional group .
verification of representative genes by real-time rt-pcr
to verify the expression patterns that were identified in the cdna-aflp study, the expression level of four de-tdfs was analyzed by real-time rt-pcr.
these tdfs were chosen to represent the various functional categories identified .
two of the selected tdfs  were more abundant in infected plants, whereas two tdfs  showed higher expression in healthy plants.
the  <dig> s rna gene of mexican lime tree was used as a reference gene for data normalization, as described previously  <cit> .
real-time pcr analysis showed that the expression of the selected genes agreed well with the profiles determined by cdna-aflp .
discussion
in this study, we performed a comparative transcriptomic analysis of healthy mexican lime trees and those infected by "ca.
phytoplasma aurantifolia" by using cdna-aflp technique.
for this analysis, we used leaf samples from healthy controls and infected plants at the symptomatic stage.
the symptomatic stage was chosen because the plant/pathogen interaction is well established but the plant cells are still active and can maintain pathogen survival.
as far as we are aware, our study is the first gene expression analysis of the compatible interaction between "ca.
phytoplasma aurantifolia" and mexican lime trees.
we observed transcriptional changes that affected the expression of several genes related to physiological functions that would affect most leaves in infected tissues.
the cdna-aflp method for global transcriptional analysis is an open architecture technology that is appropriate for gene expression studies in non-model species.
this is because prior sequence data are not required for the visual identification of differentially-expressed transcripts, in contrast to other approaches.
infection with "ca.
phytoplasma aurantifolia" causes widespread gene repression in mexican lime trees
sixty-seven percent of the identified de-tdfs were down-regulated in response to infection, whereas only 33% were up-regulated in response to infection which could reflect the exploitation of cellular resources and the suppression of defence responses by the phytoplasma  <cit> .
responses to external stimuli and defence
several genes that were modulated in mexican lime trees by infection with "ca.
phytoplasma aurantifolia" were related to defence, cell walls, and response to stress.
the expression of autophagy protein  <dig> was repressed.
autophagy is a survival mechanism that protects cells against unfavourable environmental conditions, such as microbial pathogen infection, oxidative stress, nutrient starvation, and aggregation of damaged proteins  <cit> .
it has been shown that carbohydrate starvation induces the expression of autophagy genes  <cit>  and stimulates the formation of reactive oxidative species  in plants  <cit> .
biochemical analyses on phytoplasma-infected tobacco plants have indicated that soluble carbohydrates and starch were accumulated in source leaves, whereas sink organs showed a marked decrease in sugar levels.
similar changes in carbohydrate metabolism have been described in coconut palms infected with the lethal yellowing phytoplasma  <cit> .
it is likely that the accumulation of carbohydrate reduces the expression of autophagy genes in the host and limits the burst of ros burst .
these effects might result in reduced host resistance to phytoplasma and create a suitable conditions for phytoplasma survival in the host.
we also identified a cell wall hydroxyl proline-rich protein  that was induced in response to the pathogen.
proline-rich proteins are among the major structural proteins of plant cell walls.
environmental stresses can alter the composition of the plant cell wall markedly  <cit> .
it has been demonstrated that mechanical wounding, infection, or elicitors obtained from microbial cell walls or culture fluids caused accumulation of specific hydroxyl proline-rich glycoproteins and other antimicrobial cell wall proteins  <cit> .
it has been reported that elicitors cause an h2o2-mediated oxidative cross-linking of preexisting structural cell wall proteins that precedes the activation of transcription-dependent defences.
the induction of the hydroxyl proline-rich protein in the present study might reflect a defence mechanism of mexican lime tree in response to phytoplasma infection.
another induced protein  contained a lysine domain that is found in several enzymes that are involved in degradation of the bacterial cell wall  <cit> .
the role of this gene in the response of mexican lime trees to the pathogens remains to be determined.
two of repressed genes  were identified as a modifier of snc <dig> .
plant resistance  genes encode immune receptors that recognise pathogens directly or indirectly and activate defence responses  <cit> .
the expression levels of r genes have to be regulated tightly due to costs to the fitness of plants that are associated with maintaining r-protein-mediated resistance.
recently, it has been reported that mos <dig> regulates the expression of snc <dig> which encodes a tir-nb-lrr-type of r protein in arabidopsis.
it has been shown that mos <dig> mutations reduce the expression of endogenous snc <dig>  which results in the repression of constitutive resistance responses that are mediated by snc <dig>  <cit> .
it is likely that down-regulation of mexican lime tree mos <dig> in response to the pathogen reflects a reduction in plant resistance responses to phytoplasma infection.
cell metabolisms
lipid-derived molecules act as signals in plantpathogen interactions, and the roles of jasmonic acid and related oxylipins that are produced from membrane-derived fatty acids through beta-oxidation, are particularly important  <cit> .
during infection, low level defence responses can be activated in susceptible plants  <cit> .
therefore, it is likely that well-established "ca.
phytoplasma aurantifolia" infections involve the up-regulation of genes that encode components of the lipid metabolism pathway, such as phosphatidyl glycerol specific phospholipase c-like .
this enzyme regulates the phosphatidylglycerol content via a phospholipase c-type degradation mechanism  <cit> .
another gene involved in lipid metabolisms, glycerophosphoryl diester phosphodiesterase  was repressed during the infection.
this enzyme has both phosphoric diester hydrolase and glycerophosphodiester phosphodiesterase activity and is involved in the metabolism of glycerol and lipids  <cit> .
protein synthesis and destination
we identified several tdfs that were related to protein metabolism in our study.
among these were genes that encoded ribosomal proteins and enzymes involved in degradation.
the expression of two ubiquitin-protein ligases  and one  <dig> s ribosomal protein l <dig>  were repressed, whereas another  <dig> s ribosomal protein l <dig>  was induced.
this suggests that the infection results in a general induction of protein turnover, which could reflect an adaptive response in the plants to remove misfolded proteins that have accumulated as a result of stress  <cit> .
signal transduction
three of the modulated genes had signal transduction and/or gene regulation functions.
they corresponded two transducin family protein  that were repressed by infection and a serine/threonine protein kinases  that was induced during infection.
serine/threonine protein kinases are a group of enzymes that catalyse the phosphorylation of serine or threonine residues in proteins, with atp or other nucleotides acting as phosphate donors.
the phosphorylation of proteins on serine, threonine, or tyrosine residues is an important biochemical mechanism to regulate the activity of enzymes and is used in many cellular processes  <cit> .
the two down-regulated proteins were identified as members of the transducin family and contained wd <dig> domain.
this domain is found in several eukaryotic proteins that with wide variety of functions, which include adaptor/regulatory modules in signal transduction, together with proteins involved in pre-mrna processing, and cytoskeleton assembly  <cit> .
it is unclear how these changes contribute to the response of mexican lime tree to infection.
CONCLUSIONS
we believe that this study is the first reported analysis of the expression of genes involved in the interaction of mexican lime trees with "ca.
phytoplasma aurantifolia".
the cdna-aflp technique allowed several novel genes to be identified from mexican lime trees, because a significant proportion of the tdfs are not currently represented in citrus databases.
our data showed that infection resulted in the down-regulation of mexican lime tress transcripts in all major functional categories.
however, certain genes that were required for plant-pathogen interactions were modulated positively during infection at the symptomatic stage.
these results will serve as a basis to address new questions and design new experiments to elucidate the biology of plant-phytoplasma interactions and the associated re-programming of the host metabolism.
they might also pave the way to identify genes that can be targeted to elevate plant resistance or inhibit the growth and reproduction of the pathogen.
however, further research is required to elucidate the roles of these genes in the susceptibility/resistance of mexican lime tress to "ca.
phytoplasma aurantifolia", and to determine how strategies might be developed to incorporate these genes into molecular breeding programmes.

 "candidatus phytoplasma aurantifolia" is an obligate biotrophic plant pathogen that causes witches' broom disease in mexican lime trees. this is a devastating disease that results in significant economic losses. phytoplasmas are prokaryotes that inhabit the phloem and are transmitted by phloem-sucking insects. it has been demonstrated that "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia" is transmitted by the leafhopper hishimonus phycitis. the mechanisms that regulate the distribution of phytoplasmas in the host tissue is still widely unknown. at the tissue level, phytoplasma infection can cause anatomical aberrations such as extensive necrosis the phloem and phloem tissue proliferation, which results in swollen veins. reduced stomatal conductance has also been observed, together with impaired photosynthesis. the genomes of the phytoplasmas are extremely reduced and many genes that encode components of essential metabolic pathways in other organisms are missing. it is likely phytoplasmas are unable to synthesize nucleotides and need to import them from the host plant. important genes encode for enzymes involved in the biosynthesis of amino acids and fatty acids are also missing. in addition, because phytoplasmas are the only known organisms without an atp-synthase, they probably need to import atp from the environment as well. this highly specialised nutritional requirements, which typifies biotrophic plant pathogens such as phytoplasmas, probably involves the strict control of host cell metabolism which is diverted to maintain a suitable environment for the pathogen. the molecular details of the infection process are largely unknown. initial details were obtained from studies of phytoplasma/plant interactions with respect to polyphenol production and the transport of sugar and amino acid and comprehensive differences in gene expression have reported mainly in the experimental host plant periwinkle. however, molecular data from the direct investigation of compatible interactions in cultivated mexican lime tree genotypes are scarce, and witches' broom disease has received little attention as compared with diseases carried by other phytoplasma pathogens, such as aster yellows phytoplasma. in this study, we applied a cdna- amplified fragment length polymorphism approach to identify genes that may be expressed differentially in mexican lime trees infected with "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia". understanding the basis of susceptibility to the pathogen will assist greatly in the development of new control strategies and the identification of pathogen and host factors that are required for disease progression.  five months after grafting healthy mexican lime trees, plants developed the typical symptoms of witches' broom. the results of nested pcr further confirmed the incidence of phytoplasma infection in grafted plants. analysis with iphyclassifier revealed that the virtual restriction fragment length polymorphism pattern that was derived from the phytoplasma s rdna fragment amplified from the diseased specimens was most similar to the reference pattern of the 16sr group ii, subgroup b phytoplasma, with a pattern similarity coefficient of. therefore, the phytoplasma under study was a variant of 16srii-b and related to "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia". cdna-aflp analysis for each of the primer combinations, 40- different transcript derived fragments, which ranged from to bp, were visualized as bands. analysis of the expression profiles of the infected and noninfected samples between replicates revealed differentially expressed tdfs that showed the same pattern in all replicates. fifty-one of these de-tdfs were isolated and sequenced. the remaining four de-tdfs could not be cloned and were excluded from analysis. out of the sequenced de-tdfs, showed similarity to known gene sequences in databases, whereas de-tdfs did not show homology to any known nucleotide or amino acid sequences. all tdfs sequences were submitted to the ncbi database with accession numbers assigned and reported in table tdfs were cloned and sequenced from one health or infected plant. gene ontology analysis of mexican lime tree transcripts modulated by witches broom infection each of the sequenced transcript was annotated functionally through careful analysis of the scientific literature and the gene ontology databases. out of sequenced de-tdfs, could be assigned to one of the following functional groups: stress response/defense, cell metabolism, protein synthesis/destination, signal transduction, transporter, transcription, cytoskeleton and unknown function. the molecular function of each individual protein is given in table the stress response/defence group contained % of the de-tdfs and constituted the largest functional group. verification of representative genes by real-time rt-pcr to verify the expression patterns that were identified in the cdna-aflp study, the expression level of four de-tdfs was analyzed by real-time rt-pcr. these tdfs were chosen to represent the various functional categories identified. two of the selected tdfs were more abundant in infected plants, whereas two tdfs showed higher expression in healthy plants. the s rna gene of mexican lime tree was used as a reference gene for data normalization, as described previously. real-time pcr analysis showed that the expression of the selected genes agreed well with the profiles determined by cdna-aflp. discussion in this study, we performed a comparative transcriptomic analysis of healthy mexican lime trees and those infected by "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia" by using cdna-aflp technique. for this analysis, we used leaf samples from healthy controls and infected plants at the symptomatic stage. the symptomatic stage was chosen because the plant/pathogen interaction is well established but the plant cells are still active and can maintain pathogen survival. as far as we are aware, our study is the first gene expression analysis of the compatible interaction between "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia" and mexican lime trees. we observed transcriptional changes that affected the expression of several genes related to physiological functions that would affect most leaves in infected tissues. the cdna-aflp method for global transcriptional analysis is an open architecture technology that is appropriate for gene expression studies in non-model species. this is because prior sequence data are not required for the visual identification of differentially-expressed transcripts, in contrast to other approaches. infection with "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia" causes widespread gene repression in mexican lime trees sixty-seven percent of the identified de-tdfs were down-regulated in response to infection, whereas only 33% were up-regulated in response to infection which could reflect the exploitation of cellular resources and the suppression of defence responses by the phytoplasma. responses to external stimuli and defence several genes that were modulated in mexican lime trees by infection with "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia" were related to defence, cell walls, and response to stress. the expression of autophagy protein was repressed. autophagy is a survival mechanism that protects cells against unfavourable environmental conditions, such as microbial pathogen infection, oxidative stress, nutrient starvation, and aggregation of damaged proteins. it has been shown that carbohydrate starvation induces the expression of autophagy genes and stimulates the formation of reactive oxidative species in plants. biochemical analyses on phytoplasma-infected tobacco plants have indicated that soluble carbohydrates and starch were accumulated in source leaves, whereas sink organs showed a marked decrease in sugar levels. similar changes in carbohydrate metabolism have been described in coconut palms infected with the lethal yellowing phytoplasma. it is likely that the accumulation of carbohydrate reduces the expression of autophagy genes in the host and limits the burst of ros burst. these effects might result in reduced host resistance to phytoplasma and create a suitable conditions for phytoplasma survival in the host. we also identified a cell wall hydroxyl proline-rich protein that was induced in response to the pathogen. proline-rich proteins are among the major structural proteins of plant cell walls. environmental stresses can alter the composition of the plant cell wall markedly. it has been demonstrated that mechanical wounding, infection, or elicitors obtained from microbial cell walls or culture fluids caused accumulation of specific hydroxyl proline-rich glycoproteins and other antimicrobial cell wall proteins. it has been reported that elicitors cause an h2o2-mediated oxidative cross-linking of preexisting structural cell wall proteins that precedes the activation of transcription-dependent defences. the induction of the hydroxyl proline-rich protein in the present study might reflect a defence mechanism of mexican lime tree in response to phytoplasma infection. another induced protein contained a lysine domain that is found in several enzymes that are involved in degradation of the bacterial cell wall. the role of this gene in the response of mexican lime trees to the pathogens remains to be determined. two of repressed genes were identified as a modifier of snc. plant resistance genes encode immune receptors that recognise pathogens directly or indirectly and activate defence responses. the expression levels of r genes have to be regulated tightly due to costs to the fitness of plants that are associated with maintaining r-protein-mediated resistance. recently, it has been reported that mos regulates the expression of snc which encodes a tir-nb-lrr-type of r protein in arabidopsis. it has been shown that mos mutations reduce the expression of endogenous snc which results in the repression of constitutive resistance responses that are mediated by snc. it is likely that down-regulation of mexican lime tree mos in response to the pathogen reflects a reduction in plant resistance responses to phytoplasma infection. cell metabolisms lipid-derived molecules act as signals in plantpathogen interactions, and the roles of jasmonic acid and related oxylipins that are produced from membrane-derived fatty acids through beta-oxidation, are particularly important. during infection, low level defence responses can be activated in susceptible plants. therefore, it is likely that well-established "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia" infections involve the up-regulation of genes that encode components of the lipid metabolism pathway, such as phosphatidyl glycerol specific phospholipase c-like. this enzyme regulates the phosphatidylglycerol content via a phospholipase c-type degradation mechanism. another gene involved in lipid metabolisms, glycerophosphoryl diester phosphodiesterase was repressed during the infection. this enzyme has both phosphoric diester hydrolase and glycerophosphodiester phosphodiesterase activity and is involved in the metabolism of glycerol and lipids. protein synthesis and destination we identified several tdfs that were related to protein metabolism in our study. among these were genes that encoded ribosomal proteins and enzymes involved in degradation. the expression of two ubiquitin-protein ligases and one s ribosomal protein l were repressed, whereas another s ribosomal protein l was induced. this suggests that the infection results in a general induction of protein turnover, which could reflect an adaptive response in the plants to remove misfolded proteins that have accumulated as a result of stress. signal transduction three of the modulated genes had signal transduction and/or gene regulation functions. they corresponded two transducin family protein that were repressed by infection and a serine/threonine protein kinases that was induced during infection. serine/threonine protein kinases are a group of enzymes that catalyse the phosphorylation of serine or threonine residues in proteins, with atp or other nucleotides acting as phosphate donors. the phosphorylation of proteins on serine, threonine, or tyrosine residues is an important biochemical mechanism to regulate the activity of enzymes and is used in many cellular processes. the two down-regulated proteins were identified as members of the transducin family and contained wd domain. this domain is found in several eukaryotic proteins that with wide variety of functions, which include adaptor/regulatory modules in signal transduction, together with proteins involved in pre-mrna processing, and cytoskeleton assembly. it is unclear how these changes contribute to the response of mexican lime tree to infection.  we believe that this study is the first reported analysis of the expression of genes involved in the interaction of mexican lime trees with "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia". the cdna-aflp technique allowed several novel genes to be identified from mexican lime trees, because a significant proportion of the tdfs are not currently represented in citrus databases. our data showed that infection resulted in the down-regulation of mexican lime tress transcripts in all major functional categories. however, certain genes that were required for plant-pathogen interactions were modulated positively during infection at the symptomatic stage. these results will serve as a basis to address new questions and design new experiments to elucidate the biology of plant-phytoplasma interactions and the associated re-programming of the host metabolism. they might also pave the way to identify genes that can be targeted to elevate plant resistance or inhibit the growth and reproduction of the pathogen. however, further research is required to elucidate the roles of these genes in the susceptibility/resistance of mexican lime tress to "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia", and to determine how strategies might be developed to incorporate these genes into molecular breeding programmes. 
"candidatus phytoplasma aurantifolia", is the causative agent of witches' broom disease in mexican lime trees, and is responsible for major losses of mexican lime trees in southern iran and oman. therefore, we have applied a cdna- amplified fragment length polymorphism approach to analyze gene expression in mexican lime trees infected by "ca. we carried out cdna-aflp analysis on grafted infected mexican lime trees of the susceptible cultivar at the representative symptoms stage. the present study identifies a number of candidate genes that might be involved in the interaction of mexican lime trees with "candidatus phytoplasma aurantifolia". these results should help to elucidate the molecular basis of the infection process and to identify genes that could be targeted to increase plant resistance and inhibit the growth and reproduction of the pathogen. these included the genes for modifier of snc and autophagy protein furthermore, down-regulation of genes involved in metabolism, transcription, transport and cytoskeleton was observed, which included the genes for formin, importin β transducin, l-asparaginase, glycerophosphoryl diester phosphodiesterase, and rna polymerase β. in contrast, genes that encoded a proline-rich protein, ubiquitin-protein ligase, phosphatidyl glycerol specific phospholipase c-like, and serine/threonine-protein kinase were up-regulated during the infection.
 "candidatus phytoplasma aurantifolia", is the causative agent of witches' broom disease in mexican lime trees, and is responsible for major losses of mexican lime trees in southern iran and oman. the pathogen is strictly biotrophic, and thus is completely dependent on living host cells for its survival. the molecular basis of compatibility and disease development in this system is poorly understood. therefore, we have applied a cdna- amplified fragment length polymorphism approach to analyze gene expression in mexican lime trees infected by "ca. phytoplasma aurantifolia".  we carried out cdna-aflp analysis on grafted infected mexican lime trees of the susceptible cultivar at the representative symptoms stage. selective amplifications with primer combinations allowed the visualisation of transcript-derived fragments that were expressed differentially between infected and non-infected leaves. we sequenced fragments, of which were identified as lime tree transcripts after homology searching. of the genes, % were down-regulated during infection and could be classified into various functional groups. we showed that mexican lime tree genes that were homologous to known resistance genes tended to be repressed in response to infection. these included the genes for modifier of snc and autophagy protein furthermore, down-regulation of genes involved in metabolism, transcription, transport and cytoskeleton was observed, which included the genes for formin, importin β transducin, l-asparaginase, glycerophosphoryl diester phosphodiesterase, and rna polymerase β. in contrast, genes that encoded a proline-rich protein, ubiquitin-protein ligase, phosphatidyl glycerol specific phospholipase c-like, and serine/threonine-protein kinase were up-regulated during the infection.  the present study identifies a number of candidate genes that might be involved in the interaction of mexican lime trees with "candidatus phytoplasma aurantifolia". these results should help to elucidate the molecular basis of the infection process and to identify genes that could be targeted to increase plant resistance and inhibit the growth and reproduction of the pathogen. 