SUMMARY The grass powdery mildew fungus, Blumeria graminis is classified into eight formae speciales (ff.spp.) based on strict host specialization. However, evidence suggests that host ranges extend to more than one genus and are particularly diverse among samples from the Middle East, the proposed centre of origin and diversification of crop plants. This study investigated whether geographical...

Plant processes resulting from primary or secondary metabolism have been hypothesized to contribute to defense against microbial attack. Barley chorismate synthase (HvCS), anthranilate synthase alpha subunit 2 (HvASa2), and chorismate mutase 1 (HvCM1) occupy pivotal branch points downstream of the shikimate pathway leading to the synthesis of aromatic amino acids. Here, we provide functional ev...

Twenty-nine species of plant-parasitic nematodes were recovered from 282 soil samples collected from turfgrasses in 19 counties in North Carolina (NC) and 20 counties in South Carolina (SC) during 2011 and from previous collections. These nematodes belong to 22 genera in 15 families, including Belonolaimus longicaudatus, Dolichodorus heterocephalus, Filenchus cylindricus, Helicotylenchus dihyst...

Blumeria graminis (Ascomycota) includes fungal pathogens that infect numerous grasses and cereals. Despite its economic impact on agriculture and its scientific importance in plant-pathogen interaction studies, the evolution of different lineages with different host ranges is poorly understood. Moreover, the taxonomy of grass powdery mildew is rather exceptional: there is only one described spe...

The investigation of obligate biotrophic pathogens, for example Blumeria graminis, presents a number of challenges. The sensitivity of many assays is reduced because of the presence of host material. Furthermore, the fungal structures inside and outside of the plant possess very different characteristics. Normalization genes are used in quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) to...