Plant diseases heavily affct plant growth and crop yield even in modern agriculture. Control its difficult because pathogens mutate frequently, and this leads in frequent breaking of disease resistance in commercial cultivars. The excessive application of chemical pesticides is not only producing pesticide-resistant pathogens, but it is harming the environment threatening the health of human beings. Therefore, the use of biological control agents (BCA) may provide an environmental friendly alternative to chemicals for plant disease control. Hypersensitive response (HR) and systemic acquired resistance (SAR) are the typical expressions of plant defense reactions. Once SAR is established,, the plants exhibits a broad-spectrum of disease resistance against pathogen attack. Researchers have identified elicitor proteins, such as elicitins and harpins, which activate plant defense reactions. It would be useful to explore the possibility of using biological control agents to induce a status of SAR in crop plants. Trichoderma viride is an ubiquitous soil saprophyte and a biological control agent acting by competition for nutrients, antibiosis, and mycoparasitism. If T. viride could be used as a producer and carrier of an elicitor protein, it may be used as a novel BCA specifically active on some plants. To test this possibility, we used cryptogein, a proteinaceous elicitor secreted by Phytophthora cryptogea, to bio-engineering T. viride . The plasmid containing the Crypt gene or its mutated form, was introduced into T. viride genome by using the restriction enzyme mediated integration (REMI) method. The transformed T. viride was able to produce the Crypt protein and to improve disease resistance when the mutants were applied on tobacco plants. In summary our study included: 1. Construction of pCSNTCC and pCSNTCCm plasmids: Crypt gene was mutated by changing the K at position 13 of Crypt into a V (the mutated form was named CryK13V) as described elsewhere. In order allow secretion of the transgenic protein in T. viride cells, a signal sequence of a chitinase gene from Trichoderma (ThChi) was fused to the 5’ end of Crypt and CryK13V. The chimeric genes were placed under the control of trpC promoter in the vector pCSN43. A hygromycin resistant gene was introduced into the vectors, thus obtaining the plasmids pCSNTCC (for Crypt gene) and pCSNTCCm (CrypK13V) . 2. Establishment of a T. viride transformation system:The optimum conditions for T. viride protoplasts isolation and regeneration from were determined. For protoplast isolation, 24 hours-old hyphae of T. viride were digested with 4 mg/mL of Glucanex in phosphate buffer (pH 6.98) for 4 hours at 30 ℃, with a protoplast yield of 4.7×107 colony forming unit/mL. The maximum regeneration rate (14.5%) was obtained in the CM medium containing 0.3 mol/L KCl and 0.3 mol/L inositol. Plasmids pCSNTCC and pCSNTCCm were transformed into the protoplasts of T. viride by a Xho I restriction enzyme-mediated integration, with an efficiency of 1-2 transformants per microgram of DNA. Thirty transformants were obtained, TV-1 to TV-20 for Crypt gene and TV-21 to TV-30 for CrypK13V gene. The presence of the hygromycin resistance gene in the transformants was determined by polymerase chain reactions. The elicitor protein was detected in the culture media by western blot analysis but not inside the cells. The result indicated that the exogenous gene was expressed in T. viride , but the transgenic protein was entirely secreted into the culture media. 3. Expression of Crypt gene in T. viride enhanced plant disease resistance:Tobacco plants (4-6 week-old) were treated with spores of the transgenic or the wild-type T. viride applied to the soil. After ten days the plants or detached leaves were inoculated with Phytophthora parasitica var nicotianae, Alternaria alternata, Pseudomonas syringae pv. tabaci (Pst), or Tobacco mosaic virus (TMV). The lesions caused by TMV were suppressed by the treatment with the transgenic T. viride as compared with the wild-type strai Plant diseases heavily affct plant growth and crop yield even even in modern agriculture. Control its difficult because of pathogens mutate frequently, and this leads in frequent breaking of disease resistance in commercial cultivars. The excessive application of chemical pesticides is not only producing pesticide-resistant pathogens, Hypersensitive response (HR) and systemic acquired resistance (SAR) are the typical expressions of plant defense reactions. Once SAR is established, the plants exhibits a broad-spectrum of disease resistance against pathogen attack. Researchers have identified elicitor proteins, such as elicitins and harpins, which activate plant defense reactions. to explore the possibility of using biological control agents to induce a status o f SAR in crop plants. Trichoderma viride is an ubiquitous soil saprophyte and a biological control agent acting by competition for nutrients, antibiosis, and mycoparasitism. If T. viride could be used as a producer and carrier of an elicitor protein, it may be used as a novel BCA specifically active on some plants. To test this possibility, we used cryptogein, a proteinaceous elicitor secreted by Phytophthora cryptogea, to bio-engineering T. viride. The plasmid containing the Crypt gene or its mutated form, was introduced into T . viride genome by using the restriction enzyme mediated integration (REMI) method. The transformed T. viride able to produce the Crypt protein and to improve disease resistance when the mutants were applied on tobacco plants. of pCSNTCC and pCSNTCCm plasmids: Crypt gene was mutated by changing the K at position 13 of Crypt into a V (the mutated form was named CryK13V) as described elsewhere. In order allow secretion of the transgenic protein in T. viride cells, a signal sequence of a chitinase gene from Trichoderma (ThChi) was fused to the 5 ’end of Crypt and CryK13V. The chimeric genes were placed under the control of trpC promoter in the Vector pCSN43. A hygromycin resistant gene was introduced into the vectors, thus obtained the plasmids pCSNTCC (for Crypt gene) and pCSNTCCm (CrypK13V). 2. Establishment of a T. viride transformation system: The optimum conditions for T. viride protoplasts isolation and For protoplast isolation, 24 hours-old hyphae of T. viride were digested with 4 mg / mL of Glucanex in phosphate buffer (pH 6.98) for 4 hours at 30 ° C with a protoplast yield of 4.7 × 10 7 colony forming unit / mL. The maximum regeneration rate (14.5%) was obtained in the CM medium containing 0.3 mol / L KCl and 0.3 mol / L inositol. Plasmids pCSNTCC and pCSNTCCm were transformed into the protoplasts of T. viride by a Xho I restrictionenzyme-mediated integration with an efficiency of 1-2 transformants per microgram of DNA. Thirty transformants were obtained, TV-1 to TV-20 for Crypt gene and TV-21 to TV-30 for CrypK13V gene. The presence of the hygromycin resistance gene in the transformants was determined by polymerase chain reactions. The elicitor protein was detected in the culture media by western blot analysis but not inside the cells. The result indicated that the exogenous gene was expressed in T. viride, but the transgenic protein was 3. secreted into the culture media. 3. Expression of Crypt gene in T. viride enhanced plant disease resistance: Tobacco plants (4-6 week-old) were treated with spores of the transgenic or the wild-type T. viride applied to the After ten days the plants or detached leaves were inoculated with Phytophthora parasitica var nicotianae, Alternaria alternata, Pseudomonas syringae pv. tabaci (Pst), or Tobacco mosaic virus (TMV). The lesions caused by TMV were suppressed by the treatment with the transgenic T. viride as compared with the wild-type strai