I need to determinate how virulent is a fungus/oomycete strain-specie in comparative with others. I have plants group with and without fungus symptoms. However I found the fungus sources in both (control and infected).
How can I measure/quantify the virulence intensity in infected plants in comparation with controls?
One method might be to calculate 'Area Under Disease Progress Curves' (AUDPC) and compare the curves between isolates. The APS website has some R code that can help with calculation and plotting.
https://www.apsnet.org/edcenter/disimpactmngmnt/topc/EcologyAndEpidemiologyInR/DiseaseProgress/Pages/AUDPC.aspx
To measure the virulence intensity of a fungus strain in a host plant, you can quantify factors such as the rate of infection, severity of symptoms, impact on plant growth, and reproductive success of the fungus. This typically involves experiments where you inoculate plants with different strains of the fungus and observe and measure these parameters over time.
Isabel Leon Sanchez Many researchers differentiate virulence and aggressiveness of plant pathogens. For instance, in the work of Michalska et al (2015), "Virulence was assessed on Black’s potato differentials R1–R11 and cv. Bzura, as well as on the set of six tomato genotypes, ... Aggressiveness scored as disease severity and sporulation intensity ... were evaluated on leaflets of susceptible cultivars of both hosts."
Michalska, A.M., Sobkowiak, S., Flis, B. et al. Virulence and aggressiveness of Phytophthora infestans isolates collected in Poland from potato and tomato plants identified no strong specificity. Eur J Plant Pathol 144, 325–336 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10658-015-0769-6
Isabel Leon Sanchez PS: sporulation intensity is highly important feature for pathogen development in field. Some strains of plant pathogenic fungi may have large difference in sporulation due to small genetic differences or virus infection, like described by Cai, G., Fry, W.E. and Hillman, B.I., 2019. PiRV-2 stimulates sporulation in Phytophthora infestans. Virus research, 271, p.197674.
Thank you so much for your answers:
Alex Ignatov Bettache Nabila Ryan Gourlie
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