Genetic transformation of host plants by Agrobacterium tumefaciens and related species represents a unique model for natural horizontal gene transfer. Almost five decades of studying the molecular interactions between Agrobacterium and its host cells have yielded countless fundamental insights into bacterial and plant biology, even though several steps of the DNA transfer process remain poorly understood. Agrobacterium spp. may utilize different pathways for transferring DNA, which likely reflects the very wide host range of Agrobacterium. Furthermore, closely related bacterial species, such as rhizobia, are able to transfer DNA to host plant cells when they are provided with Agrobacterium DNA transfer machinery and T-DNA. Homologs of Agrobacterium virulence genes are found in many bacterial genomes, but only one non-Agrobacterium bacterial strain, Rhizobium etli CFN42, harbors a complete set of virulence genes and can mediate plant genetic transformation when carrying a T-DNA-containing plasmid.

中文翻译：

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DNA从根癌农杆菌和相关细菌种转移到植物的途径。

根癌农杆菌和相关物种对宿主植物的遗传转化代表了天然水平基因转移的独特模型。尽管对DNA转移过程的几个步骤仍然知之甚少，但对农杆菌与其宿主细胞之间的分子相互作用进行的近五十年的研究已经获得了无数的细菌和植物生物学基础知识。农杆菌属 可能利用不同的途径转移DNA，这很可能反映了农杆菌的寄主范围很广。此外，当具有农杆菌DNA转移机制和T-DNA时，紧密相关的细菌物种，例如根瘤菌，能够将DNA转移至宿主植物细胞。在许多细菌基因组中都发现了农杆菌毒力基因的同系物，但只有一种非农杆菌属细菌，