(Image Credit: Anna Schroll/ PHYS.org)
A pathogen invading your body is already bad enough on its own. A pathogen invading your body, while you remain helpless and without options, is much worse. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology and the University of Pretoria a fungal pathogen that can disable the defense mechanism of cabbage plants, which allow them to spread unhindered. The said pathogen is a very dangerous one, capable of infecting hundreds of plant species.
(Image Credit: Jymm/ Wikimedia Commons)
Cabbage plants defend themselves against herbivores and pathogens by deploying a defensive mechanism called the mustard oil bomb: when the plant tissue is damaged, toxic isothiocyanates are formed and can effectively fend off attackers. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology and the University of Pretoria have now been able to show in a new study that this defense is also effective to some extent against the widespread and detrimental fungus Sclerotinia sclerotiorum. However, the pathogen uses at least two different detoxification mechanisms that enable the fungus to successfully spread on plants defended in this way. The metabolic products thus formed are non-toxic to the fungus, allowing it to grow on these plants.
Sclerotinia sclerotiorum is a devastating fungal pathogen that can infect more than 400 different plant species. The main symptom of the disease called Sclerotinia wilt or white mold is wilting. Visible are also the white, cotton-like fungal spores that overgrow plant leaves and stalks. In agriculture, rapeseed cultivation is particularly at risk. The plant disease can affect other members of the cabbage family, and also potatoes, legumes and strawberries.
Learn more about this deadly pathogen over at PHYS.org.
By Franzified
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