Reniform nematode causes significant yield losses to the soybean crop throughout the Southeast. In 2005, it was responsible for a loss of 12,698 tons of soybeans in South Carolina, and its prevalence has only increased in successive years. Cotton also serves as a reniform host, making cotton-soybean rotation systems particularly vulnerable to increased damage. Reniform nematodes induce the formation of feeding structures called syncytia in the roots of infected plants. Our goal is to identify vulnerable points in the process of syncytia formation that can be disrupted to halt the nematode life cycle and protect soybean plants. Syncytia are plant-derived structures; they form when the nematode...