Sensory assessment of Cercospora beticola sporulation for phenotyping the partial disease resistance of sugar beet genotypes.

Abstract

Abstract Background Due to its high damaging potential, Cercospora leaf spot (CLS) caused by Cercospora beticola is a continuous threat to sugar beet production worldwide. Breeding for disease resistance is hampered by the quantitative nature of resistance which may result from differences in penetration, colonization, and sporulation of the pathogen on sugar beet genotypes. In particular, problems in the quantitative assessment of C. beticola sporulation have resulted in the common practice to assess field resistance late in the growth period as quantitative resistance parameter. Recently, hyperspectral sensors have shown potential to assess differences in CLS severity. Hyperspectral microscopy was used for the quantification of C. beticola sporulation on sugar beet leaves in order to characterize the host plant suitability / resistance of genotypes for decision-making in breeding for CLS resistance. Results Assays with attached and detached leaves demonstrated that vital plant tissue is essential for the full potential of genotypic mechanisms of disease resistance and susceptibility. Spectral information (400 to 900 nm, 160 wavebands) of CLSs recorded before and after induction of C. beticola sporulation allowed the identification of sporulating leaf spot sub-areas. A supervised classification and quantification of sporulation structures was possible, but the necessity of genotype-specific reference spectra restricts the general applicability of this approach. Fungal sporulation could be quantified independent of the host plant genotype by calculating the area under the difference reflection spectrum from hyperspectral imaging before and with sporulation. The overall relationship between sensor-based and visual quantification of C. beticola sporulation on five genotypes differing in CLS resistance was R 2 = 0.81; count-based differences among genotypes could be reproduced spectrally. Conclusions For the first time, hyperspectral imaging was successfully tested for the quantification of sporulation as a fungal activity depending on host plant suitability. The potential of this non-invasive and non-destructive approach for the quantification of fungal sporulation in other host–pathogen systems and for the phenotyping of crop traits complex as sporulation resistance is discussed.

Plant phenotyping relevance

サトウダイコン葉の病害関連形質である胞子形成を、ハイパースペクトル画像で定量する手法を開発・検証しており、植物フェノタイピング手法が中心です。

Code and data availability

The article describes hyperspectral imaging phenotyping of Cercospora beticola sporulation on sugar beet genotypes, but no public phenotype dataset, hyperspectral images, analysis code, or trained model is deposited or linked. The only supplement (Additional file 1) contains a correlation figure, not the underlying or

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