Sanna, M.; Martino, I.; Guarnaccia, V.; Mezzalama, M. Diversity and Pathogenicity of Fusarium Species Associated with Stalk and Crown Rot in Maize in Northern Italy. Plants2023, 12, 3857.
Sanna, M.; Martino, I.; Guarnaccia, V.; Mezzalama, M. Diversity and Pathogenicity of Fusarium Species Associated with Stalk and Crown Rot in Maize in Northern Italy. Plants 2023, 12, 3857.
Sanna, M.; Martino, I.; Guarnaccia, V.; Mezzalama, M. Diversity and Pathogenicity of Fusarium Species Associated with Stalk and Crown Rot in Maize in Northern Italy. Plants2023, 12, 3857.
Sanna, M.; Martino, I.; Guarnaccia, V.; Mezzalama, M. Diversity and Pathogenicity of Fusarium Species Associated with Stalk and Crown Rot in Maize in Northern Italy. Plants 2023, 12, 3857.
Abstract
The genus Fusarium includes several agronomically important and toxin-producing species, that are worldwide distributed and can cause a wide range of diseases. Crown and stalk rots and grain infections are among the most severe symptoms that Fusarium spp. can cause on maize. The disease development usually occurs during germination, but it may also affect the later phases of plant growth. The purpose of this study was to investigate the diversity and the patho-genicity of 41 isolates recovered from symptomatic seedlings collected in Northern Italy, and from seeds with five different geographical origins during 2019 and 2020. The pathogenicity was tested and confirmed on 23 isolates causing rotting on maize seedlings. A multi-locus phylogeny analysis, based on four genomic loci (tef1-α, rpb2, calm and tub2), was performed for 23 repre-sentative isolates. Representative isolates were identified as species belonging to three species complexes (SC). Fusarium verticillioides and F. annulatum in the F. fujikuroi SC. Fusarium commune was identified in the F. nisikadoi SC, and three different lineages were found in the Fusarium ox-ysporum SC. This study reports F. annulatum, and two lineages of the Fusarium oxysporum SC as maize pathogens for the first time in Italy.
Keywords
Zea mays L.; F. fujikuroi SC; F. nisikadoi SC; F. oxysporum SC; multi-locus sequence typing
Subject
Biology and Life Sciences, Agricultural Science and Agronomy
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
