Fig. 2

Strategy diagram of cotton and V. dahliae in the arms race between host and pathogen. The diagram presents the ancient Chinese symbol of Taiji, indicating that the attack of V. dahliae and the defense of cotton are systematic and complex, with a synergistic evolutionary relationship. V. dahliae has evolved a sophisticated pathogenicity mechanism to infect cotton, a cascade of reaction involving microsclerotia development, effector proteins, transcription factors, etc.; on the contrary, cotton has taken a series of defensive measures, including plant basic resistance, PTI/ETI, hormone signaling, etc.