Identification and Characterization of Pathogen Responsible for Causing Southern Corn Leaf Blight (SCLB) Disease in Malaysia
Year: 2021
Type: article
Abstract: Corn is considered an important cereal crop world over.This work aimed to characterize the causative agent of southern corn leaf blight disease.Diseased samples with fusiform, elliptical and elongated lesions on the leaves were obtained from affected farms of four different areas within Malaysia.The morphological characters of the 10 isolates were observed.The conidia were curved and elongated.The results of morphological characteristics showed that potato sucrose agar was suitable for the rapid growth of pathogen with a mean of 10.19 mm day -1 , followed by corn meal agar (8.56 mm day -1 ) and potato dextrose agar (5.46 mm day -1 ).The temperature of 30°C was found the most suitable for pathogen growth with a mean of 7.30 mm day -1 .These isolates were classified into 4 groups in terms of colony color: dark gray, light gray, gray to green and gray.The conidial length ranged from 44.12 µm to 81.61 µm for isolate CH006 and CH004, respectively.Likewise, the number of septa ranged from 4-6 to 8-10 for isolates CH006 and CH004, respectively.The pathogenicity test on corn variety Thai Super Sweet (TSS) showed that the isolates CH001 and CH009 were the most aggressive while the isolate CH010 was the least aggressive.Results from molecular and morphology studies confirmed that all the 10 isolates were identified as C. heterostrophus.We suggest that as a result of the race diversity of C. heterostrophus, further investigations should be carried out on virulence determination and race detection of this pathogen.
Language: English
Subfield: Plant Science
Domain: Life Sciences
SDG: Zero hunger
Open Access status: bronze
Funder: Universiti Putra Malaysia
OpenAlex ID: W4417523285