Virology

With colleagues at the Scripps Research Institute and UC Riverside, Cooper discovered that plants genetically engineered to express a defective mutant of the tobacco mosaic virus (TMV) movement protein were resistant to TMV and viruses from five other families. Continued research performed by Cooper and associates has led to expanded efforts to understand the mechanism of resistance, modes of virus spread, potential ways resistance could be overcome, the functional domains of the TMV movement protein, and the complementary effects between movement proteins and coat proteins of heterologous viruses. In 2014, Cooper first reported the artificial synthesis of an infectious plant virus particle.

Papers:

Expression of a Synthetic Rust Fungal Virus cDNA in Yeast. Bret Cooper, Kimberly B. Campbell, and Wesley M. Garrett (2016). Archives of Virology, 161, 111-123.

Proof by synthesis of Tobacco mosaic virus (2014). Bret Cooper. Genome Biology, 15, R67. Published on-line May 12, 2014.

Disruption of Rpp1-mediated soybean rust immunity by virus-induced gene silencing (2013). Bret Cooper, Kimberly B. Campbell, Michael B. McMahon, and Douglas G. Luster. Plant Signaling & Behavior, 8, e27543-1-9; http://dx.doi.org/10.4161/psb.27543.

Capsid Protein Gene and the Type of Host Plant Differentially Modulate Cell-to-Cell Movement of Cowpea Chlorotic Mottle Virus (2006). A.L.N. Rao and Bret Cooper. Virus Genes, 32, 219-227.

Investigative Proteomics: Identification of an Unknown Plant Virus from Infected Plants Using Mass Spectrometry (2003). Bret Cooper,Donna Eckert, Nancy L. Andon, John R. Yates III and Paul A. Haynes. Journal of the American Society for Mass Spectrometry 14, 736-741; published online before print May 23, 2003.

Diverse RNA Viruses Elicit the Expression of Common Sets of Genes in Susceptible Arabidopsis thaliana Plants (2003). Steven A. Whitham, Sheng Quan, Bret Cooper, Bram Estes, Hur-Song Chang, Tong Zhu,Xun Wang and Yu-Ming Hou. Plant Journal, 33, 271-283.

Collateral Gene Expression Changes Induced by Distinct Plant Viruses During the Hypersensitive Resistance Reaction in Chenopodium amaranticolor (2001). Bret Cooper. Plant Journal, 26, 339-349.

Genetic Mechanisms for Engineering Host Resistance to Plant Viruses (1999). Bret Cooper. In Handbook of Biological Control. pp. 557-574. Ed. T.S. Bellows and T.W. Fisher. Academic Press, San Diego.

Domains of the TMV Movement Protein Involved in Subcellular Localization (1998). Theodore W. Kahn, Moshe Lapidot, Manfred Heinlein, Christoph Reichel, Bret Cooper, Ron Gafny and Roger N. Beachy. Plant Journal 15, 15-25.

Defective Movement of Viruses in the Family Bromoviridae Is Differentially Complemented in Nicotiana benthamiana Expressing Tobamovirus or Dianthovirus Movement Proteins (1998). A.L.N. Rao, Bret Cooper, and Carl M. Deom. Phytopathology, 88, 666-672.

Cell-to-Cell Transport of Movement-Defective Cucumber Mosaic and Tobacco Mosaic Viruses in Transgenic Plants Expressing Heterologous Movement Protein Genes (1996). Bret Cooper, Isabelle Schmitz, A.L.N. Rao, Roger N. Beachy, and J. Allan Dodds. Virology, 216, 208-213.

Differences in Subcellular Localization of Cucumber Mosaic Virus and Tobacco Mosaic Virus Movement Proteins in Transgenic and Infected Plants (1995). Bret Cooper and J. Allan Dodds. Journal of General Virology, 76, 3217-3221.

Functional Similarities between Plant Virus Movement Proteins and Approaches to Creating Transgenic Plants that Restrict Viral Movement (1995). Bret Cooper. Dissertation. University of California, Riverside.

A Defective Movement Protein of TMV in Transgenic Plants Confers Resistance to Multiple Viruses Whereas the Functional Analog Increases Susceptibility (1995). Bret Cooper, Moshe Lapidot, James A. Heick, J. Allan Dodds and Roger N. Beachy. Virology, 206, 307-313.