How large and diverse are field populations of fungal plant pathogens? The case of Zymoseptoria tritici.

ABSTRACT: Pathogen populations differ in the amount of genetic diversity they contain. Populations carrying higher genetic diversity are thought to have a greater evolutionary potential than populations carrying less diversity. We used published studies to estimate the range of values associated with two critical components of genetic diversity, the number of unique pathogen genotypes and the number of spores produced during an epidemic, for the septoria tritici blotch pathogen Zymoseptoria tritici. We found that wheat fields experiencing typical levels of infection are likely to carry between 3.1 and 14.0 million pathogen genotypes per hectare and produce at least 2.1-9.9 trillion pycnidiospores per hectare. Given the experimentally derived mutation rate of 3 × 10^-10 substitutions

SUBMITTER: McDonald BA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9488677 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature