How does an understanding of the guard hypothesis change the way we view host-pathogen dynamics

• Both models likely pertain in different specific interactions.

• Under direct interaction model the pathogen protein is recognized directly

• Under the guard hypothesis the activity of the pathogen protein is recognized.

  • R-gene may be able to recognise more than one Avr gene, more than one pathogen (Mi gene in tomato)

• It may be more difficult to circumvent recognition in the later case.