Skip to main content
ARS Home » Pacific West Area » Pullman, Washington » WHGQ » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #324109
Title: Role of alternate hosts in epidemiology and pathogen variation of cereal rusts

Author
item JIE, ZHAO - Northwest Agriculture And Forestry University
item WANG, MEINAN - Washington State University
item Chen, Xianming
item KANG, ZHENSHENG - Northwest Agriculture And Forestry University

Submitted to: Annual Review of Phytopathology
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 3/7/2016
Publication Date: 5/18/2016
Citation: Jie, Z., Wang, M., Chen, X., Kang, Z. 2016. Role of alternate hosts in epidemiology and pathogen variation of cereal rusts. Annual Review of Phytopathology. doi: 10.1146/annurev-phyto-080615-095851.

Interpretive Summary: Cereal rusts are an important group of diseases threatening the world food security. With the recent discovery of alternate hosts for the stripe rust fungus, all cereal rust fungi are now known to be heteroecious, requiring two distinct plant species serving as primary or alternate hosts to complete their sexual life cycle. The roles of the alternate hosts in disease epidemiology and pathogen variation vary greatly from species to species and from region to region with different climatic and cropping conditions. We focus this review on rust fungi of small grains, mainly stripe rust, stem rust, leaf rust, and crown rust of wheat, barley, oat, rye, and triticale, with emphases on the contributions of alternate hosts to the development and management of rust diseases.

Technical Abstract: Cereal rusts, caused by obligate and biotrophic fungi in the genus Puccinia of basidiomycete are an important group of diseases threatening the world food security. With the recent discovery of alternate hosts for the stripe rust fungus (Puccinia striiformis), all cereal rust fungi are now known to be heteroecious, requiring two distinct plant species serving as primary or alternate hosts to complete their sexual life cycle. The roles of the alternate and auxiliary hosts in disease epidemiology and pathogen variation vary greatly from species to species and from region to region with different climatic and cropping conditions. We focus this review on rust fungi of small grains, mainly stripe rust, stem rust, leaf rust, and crown rust of wheat, barley, oat, rye, and triticale, with emphases on the contributions of alternate hosts to the development and management of rust diseases.