Cyril Zipfel

Research Statement

AI generated · 2d ago

Cyril Zipfel's research centres on how plants detect and respond to microbial threats through cell-surface pattern-recognition receptors. His early first-author work established that perception of bacterial flagellin and EF-Tu by the receptors FLS2 and EFR triggers innate immunity in Arabidopsis, with the EF-Tu study showing that this perception restricts Agrobacterium-mediated transformation. Later senior-author reviews and studies examined how pattern-recognition receptor signalling is regulated and activated, including work on direct regulation of the NADPH oxidase RBOHD by the PRR-associated kinase BIK1 during immunity, and on the receptor kinase FER as a RALF-regulated scaffold controlling immune signalling. Beyond these, Zipfel contributed to the flagellin-induced FLS2–BAK1 receptor complex that initiates plant defence, a collaboration that helped define early receptor-complex assembly, and to characterising the N-terminal epitope of EF-Tu that elicits innate immunity. No software, datasets, patents, or grants are indexed beyond his publications. Across this body of work, the through-line is a sustained inquiry into the molecular machinery of plant immune perception and its exploitation for disease resistance, developed alongside collaborators such as Silke Robatzek.

Most Cited Works

Perception of the Bacterial PAMP EF-Tu by the Receptor EFR Restricts Agrobacterium-Mediated Transformation

Cyril Zipfel, Gernot Kunze, Delphine Chinchilla, Anne Caniard, Jonathan D G Jones, Thomas Boller, Georg Felix

Cell2006

2,067Citations

A flagellin-induced complex of the receptor FLS2 and BAK1 initiates plant defence

Delphine Chinchilla, Cyril Zipfel, Silke Robatzek, Birgit Kemmerling, Thorsten Nürnberger, Jonathan D G Jones, Georg Felix, Thomas Boller

Research Areas

Plant-Microbe Interactions and ImmunityImmune Response and InflammationPlant Molecular Biology ResearchPlant Pathogenic Bacteria StudiesPlant Stress Responses and Tolerance

Affiliations & Education

Employment

Universität Zürich(CH)

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