Alnicola (=Naucoria, pro parte) is a mushroom genus of strictly temperate, obligately ectomycorrhizal species, traditionally included in the family Cortinariaceae. Most Alnicola spp. are primarily host specific on Alnus, although a few are mycobionts of Salix or other hosts. The different species of Alnicola exhibit unique morphological (cystidia, pileipellis) and cytological (dikaryotic or mon...

Salt marshes located on the east coast of temperate North America are highly productive, typically nitrogen-limited, and support diverse assemblages of free-living nitrogen fixing (diazotrophic) bacteria. This article reviews and analyzes data from North Inlet estuary (SC, USA), addressing diazotroph assemblage structure and the influence of plant host and environmental conditions on the assemb...

Rhizobium is a symbiotic biological nitrogen-fixing (BNF) bacteria. and has high diversity in different geographical regions worldwide. The BNF associated with the legume trees tropical environments improves efficiency of nitrogen increases soil organic matter, fertility. consists Mesorhizobium, Sinorhizobium, Bradyrhizobium, species belonging to each genera infecting specific host. This host s...

1. Parasitoid attack strategy has been divided into two broad categories, koinobiosis and idiobiosis, based on the arrest of host development and the intimacy of larval contact. Koinobionts allow the host to continue developing and larvae usually feed within the host body, whereas idiobionts stop host development and larvae usually feed externally. 2. Comparisons of host ranges from rearings of...

Existing theory of host-parasite interactions has identified the genetic specificity of interaction as a key variable affecting the outcome of coevolution. The Matching Alleles (MA) and Gene For Gene (GFG) models have been extensively studied as the canonical examples of specific and non-specific interaction. The generality of these models has recently been challenged by uncovering real-world h...

Bacteriophage are among the most diverse and numerous microbes inhabiting our planet. Yet many laboratory activities fail to engage students in meaningful exploration of their diversity, unique characteristics, and abundance. In this curriculum activity students use a standard plaque assay to enumerate bacteriophage particles from a natural sample and use the scientific method to address questi...

Testing the host specificity of potential agents is an important part of biocontrol methodology. An understanding of the behavioral processes involved in selection of a host plant can be used to improve the accuracy of host specificity testing by biocontrol practitioners and others interested in predicting field host use. These behavioral processes include the sequential nature of host selectio...

Ecological specialization is hypothesized to result from the exploitation of predictable resource bases. For parasitic organisms, one prediction is that parasites of large-bodied host species, which tend to be long-lived, should specialize on these hosts, whereas parasites of small host species, which represent more ephemeral and less predictable resources, should become generalists. We tested ...

Xanthomonas is a large genus of bacteria that collectively cause disease on more than 300 plant species. The broad host range of the genus contrasts with stringent host and tissue specificity for individual species and pathovars. Whole-genome sequences of Xanthomonas campestris pv. raphani strain 756C and X. oryzae pv. oryzicola strain BLS256, pathogens that infect the mesophyll tissue of the l...