Effects of Abiotic Stress on Crop-Fungal Pathogen Interactions

A special issue of Plants (ISSN 2223-7747). This special issue belongs to the section "Plant Response to Abiotic Stress and Climate Change".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 October 2021) | Viewed by 6627

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
USDA ARS National Center for Agricultural Utilization Research, Peoria, USA
Interests: (Fusarium head blight; mycotoxins; food safety; abiotic and biotic stress; phytochemicals; climate change; carbon dioxide

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
USDA-ARS National Center for Agricultural Utilization Research, Peoria, IL 61604, USA
Interests: plant physiology; climate change; grain nutritional value; Fusarium head blight
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Fungal pathogens destroy approximately one third of all food crops annually. Climate change threatens to intensify these losses and jeopardize global food security because plant pathogenic fungi and oomycetes comprise the largest faction of rapidly spreading agricultural pests. Furthermore, the stressful environmental conditions of industrialized agricultural practices that rely on homogeneous and standardized control strategies have enhanced the emergence of more virulent and fungicide-resistant strains. Abiotic factors drive plant–pathogen interactions, and the individual and combined abiotic stress factors associated with climate change, including rising atmospheric CO2, temperature, and extreme precipitation events, can all influence crop susceptibility and disease severity. The impact of abiotic stress can have positive, neutral or negative effects on disease development, and each disease may respond differently to the stress depending on the pathosystem. To fully understand the dynamic plant–fungal pathogen–environment interactions that occur in nature and develop climate-resilient and disease-resistant crops, a combined interdisciplinary research effort is needed. This Special Issue of Plants will highlight emerging agricultural threats, knowledge gaps, and potential control strategies.

Dr. Martha M Vaughan
Dr. William Hay
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • climate change
  • abiotic stress
  • temperature
  • drought
  • flooding
  • rising carbon dioxide
  • fungal pathogens
  • mycotoxins
  • fungi
  • oomycetes

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

13 pages, 5262 KiB  
Article
Effects of Atmospheric CO2 and Temperature on Wheat and Corn Susceptibility to Fusarium graminearum and Deoxynivalenol Contamination
by William T. Hay, Susan P. McCormick and Martha M. Vaughan
Plants 2021, 10(12), 2582; https://doi.org/10.3390/plants10122582 - 25 Nov 2021
Cited by 19 | Viewed by 2860
Abstract
This work details the impact of atmospheric CO2 and temperature conditions on two strains of Fusarium graminearum, their disease damage, pathogen growth, mycotoxin accumulation, and production per unit fungal biomass in wheat and corn. An elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration, 1000 ppm [...] Read more.
This work details the impact of atmospheric CO2 and temperature conditions on two strains of Fusarium graminearum, their disease damage, pathogen growth, mycotoxin accumulation, and production per unit fungal biomass in wheat and corn. An elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration, 1000 ppm CO2, significantly increased the accumulation of deoxynivalenol in infected plants. Furthermore, growth in cool growing conditions, 20 °C/18 °C, day and night, respectively, resulted in the highest amounts of pathogen biomass and toxin accumulation in both inoculated wheat and corn. Warm temperatures, 25 °C/23 °C, day and night, respectively, suppressed pathogen growth and toxin accumulation, with reductions as great as 99% in corn. In wheat, despite reduced pathogen biomass and toxin accumulation at warm temperatures, the fungal pathogen was more aggressive with greater disease damage and toxin production per unit biomass. Disease outcomes were also pathogen strain specific, with complex interactions between host, strain, and growth conditions. However, we found that atmospheric CO2 and temperature had essentially no significant interactions, except for greatly increased deoxynivalenol accumulation in corn at cool temperatures and elevated CO2. Plants were most susceptible to disease damage at warm and cold temperatures for wheat and corn, respectively. This work helps elucidate the complex interaction between the abiotic stresses and biotic susceptibility of wheat and corn to Fusarium graminearum infection to better understand the potential impact global climate change poses to future food security. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Effects of Abiotic Stress on Crop-Fungal Pathogen Interactions)
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25 pages, 2731 KiB  
Article
Responses to Drought Stress Modulate the Susceptibility to Plasmopara viticola in Vitis vinifera Self-Rooted Cuttings
by Lisa Heyman, Antonios Chrysargyris, Kristof Demeestere, Nikolaos Tzortzakis and Monica Höfte
Plants 2021, 10(2), 273; https://doi.org/10.3390/plants10020273 - 30 Jan 2021
Cited by 12 | Viewed by 3103
Abstract
Climate change will increase the occurrence of plants being simultaneously subjected to drought and pathogen stress. Drought can alter the way in which plants respond to pathogens. This research addresses how grapevine responds to the concurrent challenge of drought stress and Plasmopara viticola [...] Read more.
Climate change will increase the occurrence of plants being simultaneously subjected to drought and pathogen stress. Drought can alter the way in which plants respond to pathogens. This research addresses how grapevine responds to the concurrent challenge of drought stress and Plasmopara viticola, the causal agent of downy mildew, and how one stress affects the other. Self-rooted cuttings of the drought-tolerant grapevine cultivar Xynisteri and the drought-sensitive cultivar Chardonnay were exposed to full or deficit irrigation (40% of full irrigation) and artificially inoculated with P. viticola in vitro or in planta. Leaves were sampled at an early infection stage to determine the influence of the single and combined stresses on oxidative parameters, chlorophyll, and phytohormones. Under full irrigation, Xynisteri was more susceptible to P. viticola than the drought-sensitive cultivar Chardonnay. Drought stress increased the susceptibility of grapevine leaves inoculated in vitro, but both cultivars showed resistance against P. viticola when inoculated in planta. Abscisic acid, rather than jasmonic acid and salicylic acid, seemed to play a prominent role in this resistance. The irrigation-dependent susceptibility observed in this study indicates that the practices used to mitigate the effects of climate change may have a profound impact on plant pathogens. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Effects of Abiotic Stress on Crop-Fungal Pathogen Interactions)
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