Pathogen Inoculation and Rating Strategies for Studying Maize Diseases.

Abstract

Maize is a globally important staple that is used as food for human and animal consumption, fuel, and other industrial applications. Pathogens affect all stages of the plant life cycle and every plant organ, and lead to significant yield losses. An integrated strategy incorporating cultural and chemical management practices, as well as development of resistant plant varieties, is needed to prevent yield losses due to plant diseases. Large numbers of breeding material must be screened to develop pathogen-resistant maize varieties. Inoculation methods must be high-throughput to accommodate the large screening experiments. Additionally, there needs to be an extensive understanding of the plant-pathogen interaction to use a targeted biotechnology-based approach, which takes advantage of knowledge of the system to engineer resistance. To evaluate germplasm for breeding and biotechnology approaches, inoculation methods must replicate natural infection, and disease severity must be rated consistently to accurately screen germplasm or gather data on pathogens of interest. Here, we review inoculation and rating methods for Gibberella ear rot, seedling blight caused by Globisporangium ultimum var. ultimum , and Goss's wilt that are efficient and high-throughput. We also introduce fluorescence microscopy techniques for leaf samples infected with Exserohilum turcicum , the causal agent of northern corn leaf blight. These pathogens all cause significant yield losses, and in particular, Gibberella ear rot is associated with the accumulation of harmful mycotoxins. Understanding how pathogens cause disease and how plants defend against attack is a major goal of maize pathology studies and critical for developing integrated management strategies.

Plant phenotyping relevance

トウモロコシ病害の接種および病害重症度評価法をレビューし、高スループットで一貫した植物病害表現型の取得を扱うため、方法論が中心です。感染葉の蛍光顕微鏡法も紹介されています。

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