Plant Disease (2019) 103, 2877-2883

Amit M. Philosoph, Aviv Dombrovsky, Yigal Elad, Amnon Koren and Omer Frenkel (2019)
Insight into late wilting disease of cucumber demonstrates the complexity of the phenomenon in fluctuating environments
Plant Disease 103 (11), 2877-2883
Abstract: Some diseases are caused by coinfection of several pathogens in the same plant. However, studies on the complexity of these coinfection events under different environmental conditions are scarce. Our ongoing research involves late wilting disease of cucumber caused by coinfection of Cucumber green mottle mosaic virus (CGMMV) and Pythium spp. We specifically investigated the role of various temperatures (18, 25, 32°C) on the coinfection by CGMMV and two predominant Pythium species occurring in cucumber greenhouses under Middle Eastern climatic conditions. During the summer months, Pythium aphanidermatum was most common, whereas P. spinosum predominated during the winter–spring period. P. aphanidermatum preferred higher temperatures while P. spinosum preferred low temperatures and caused very low levels of disease at 32°C when the 6-day-old seedlings were infected with P. spinosum alone. Nevertheless, after applying a later coinfection with CGMMV on the 14-day-old plants, a synergistic effect was detected for both Pythium species at optimal and suboptimal temperatures, with P. spinosum causing high mortality incidence even at 32°C. The symptoms caused by CGMMV infection appeared earlier as the temperature increased. However, within each temperature, no significant influence of the combined infection was detected. Our results demonstrate the complexity of coinfection in changing environmental conditions and indicate its involvement in disease development and severity as compared with infection by each of the pathogens alone.
(The abstract is excluded from the Creative Commons licence and has been copied with permission by the publisher.)
Link to article at publishers website
Database assignments for author(s): Aviv Dombrovsky, Yigal Elad

Research topic(s) for pests/diseases/weeds:
environment - cropping system/rotation
general biology - morphology - evolution

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Pest and/or beneficial records:

Beneficial	Pest/Disease/Weed	Crop/Product	Country	Quarant.
	Pythium aphanidermatum	Cucumber (Cucumis sativus)
	Globisporangium spinosum	Cucumber (Cucumis sativus)
	Cucumber green mottle mosaic virus	Cucumber (Cucumis sativus)