RESUMEN
Ceratocystis fimbriata is a complex of many species that cause wilt and cankers on woody plants and rot of storage roots or corms of many economically important crops worldwide. In Brazil, C. fimbriata infects different cultivated crop plants that are not native to Brazil, including Gmelina arborea, Eucalyptus spp., Mangifera indica (mango), Ficus carica (fig), and Colocasia esculenta (inhame). Phylogenetic analyses and inoculation studies were performed to test the hypothesis that there are host-specialized lineages of C. fimbriata in Brazil. The internal transcribed spacer region ribosomal DNA sequences varied greatly but there was little resolution of lineages based on these sequences. A portion of the MAT1-2 mating type gene showed less variation, and this variation corresponded more closely with host of origin. However, mango isolates were found scattered throughout the tree. Inoculation experiments on the five exotic hosts showed substantial variation in aggressiveness within and among pathogen populations. Native hosts from the same families as the exotic hosts tended to be less susceptible than the cultivated hosts, but there was little correlation between aggressiveness to the cultivated and native hosts of the same family. Cultivation and vegetative propagation of exotic crops may select for strains that are particularly aggressive on those crops.
Asunto(s)
Ascomicetos/genética , Ascomicetos/patogenicidad , Variación Genética , Enfermedades de las Plantas/microbiología , Árboles/microbiología , Ascomicetos/clasificación , Ascomicetos/aislamiento & purificación , Secuencia de Bases , Brasil , Colocasia/microbiología , ADN de Hongos/genética , ADN Espaciador Ribosómico/química , ADN Espaciador Ribosómico/genética , Eucalyptus/microbiología , Ficus/microbiología , Proteínas Fúngicas/genética , Lamiaceae/microbiología , Mangifera/microbiología , Datos de Secuencia Molecular , Filogenia , Enfermedades de las Plantas/genética , Análisis de Secuencia de ADN , Especificidad de la EspecieRESUMEN
ABSTRACT Ceratocystis fimbriata is a complex of many cryptic, host-specialized species that causes wilt and canker of woody species and rot diseases of storage roots and corms of many economically important plants worldwide. With the exception of the family Araceae, all confirmed hosts of C. fimbriata are dicotyledonous plants. We hypothesized that the isolates from members of the family Araceae would form a monophyletic lineage specialized to infect these unique hosts. Analyses of sequences of the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region of nuclear rDNA indicate that isolates and herbarium specimens of C. fimbriata from the family Araceae represent three different groups: an Xanthosoma/Syngonium group on corms of Xanthosoma spp. from the Caribbean region and on ornamental S. podophyllum from greenhouses in Florida, Hawaii, Australia, and Brazil; an inhame group on corms of Colocasia esculenta in Brazil; and a distantly related taro group on Colocasia esculenta in Hawaii and China and on X. sagittifolium in Fiji. Inoculations of three species of Araceae (Caladium bicolor, S. podophyllum, and Colocasia esculenta) showed that isolates from all three groups are pathogenic to these three hosts. Brazilian isolates from Mangifera indica and Ficus carica were only weakly pathogenic to Caladium and Syngonium sp. and were not pathogenic to Colocasia sp. Syngonium plants appeared to be most susceptible to isolates of the Xanthosoma/Syngonium group, and Colocasia plants were least susceptible to isolates from Syngonium spp. Thus, it appears that adaptations to the family Araceae have evolved more than once in the C. fimbriata complex. It is hypothesized that the three groups of C. fimbriata on the family Araceae are native to the Caribbean, Brazil, and Asia, respectively, but they have been spread elsewhere by humans.