• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.277-282
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• 2004

Amendments of a recirculating nutrient solution with potassium silicate were evaluated as a means to control Phytophthora capsici infections on pepper plant(Capsicum annuum L.). Supplying the solutions with 100 or 200 ppm of silicate significantly reduced motility, root decay, and yield losses attributed to infection of P. capsici. Treating inoculated plants with potassium silicate increased root dry weights and number of fruit, especially high-grade fruit. Results were slightly superior to non-inoculated controls. The two varieties, PBC 137 and PBC 602, responded similarly to the treatments. No significant differences were observed between the 100- and 200 ppm silicate treatments. Results were better when greenhouse conditions favored the spread of P. capsici. Silicon alone did not increase pepper yield, suggesting that it acts as a disease suppression agent rather than as a fertilizer, The phenomena by which silicon confers protection against P. capsici infection and disease development are not fully understood, but our results indicate that mechanisms other than a mechanical barrier to fungal penetration are involved.

• Research in Plant Disease
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.158-162
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• 2010

Four promising biocontrol agents against Phytophthora capsici were selected from 507 bacterial isolates collected from rhizosphere soils and roots of pepper plants. In vitro experiment, these four biocontrol agents inhibited mycelial growth, germination of cystospores, and formation of zoosporangia and zoospores of Phytophthora capsici. In the pot experiment, the four biocontrol agents showed control efficiency higher than 70%. In greenhouse experiment, the isolates G28-6 gave the control value of 79.4%. These four biocontrol agents successfully colonized in the population density beyond 105 cfu/g on roots of pepper in vitro. The isolates G28-6 was identified as Pseudomonas aurantiaca, based on its cultural, morphological, and biochemical characterization and 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis.

• Journal of Climate Change Research
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.47-59
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• 2014

This study was conducted to estimate of future productivity for major spicy vegetables by the change of meteorological factors, temperature and precipitation. Based on analysis of meteorological factors, incidence of major disease(phytophthora blight and anthracnose) for hot pepper was over 50% with temperature over $18.3^{\circ}C$ in May and precipitation over 532 mm in July. And the meteorological factors in the August have deeply related to the incidence of virus disease(CMV and BBWV2) for hot pepper, however, both the meteorological factors and the incidence of virus disease showed to the opposite tendency. An analysis of the relevance of the white rot disease and the meteorological factors for garlic, a disease was highly investigated with temperature $15.0^{\circ}C$ to $15.9^{\circ}C$ in April to May. On the onion, higher incidence of white rot was investigated with temperature over $4.0^{\circ}C$ in November to January and precipitation over 40 mm in March. The occurrence of major disease for spicy vegetables and meteorological factors as a result of regression analysis, the optimal cultivation area of peppers and onions will be gradually expanded to the central regions in the near future in Korea.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.317-321
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• 2012

Plants are the promising reservoirs for natural products with their diverse secondary metabolites. Many invasive plants have been introduced in Korea, which adversely affect on the native ecosystem but holds difficulty removing them due to their proliferation. In this study, we evaluated disease control efficacy of methanol extracts from four invasive plant species against 7 representative crop pathogens. Methanol extract of Phytolacca americana effectively suppressed rice blast, tomato gray mold, and tomato late blight in a dose dependent manner. The methanol extract of Amorpha fruticosa also exhibited potent antifungal activity against pepper anthracnose in a concentration dependent way. These data suggest that the extracts of P. americana and A. fruticosa can be developed as plant disease protection agents against rice blast, tomato gray mold, tomato late blight, and pepper anthracnose. Furthermore, more extensive research will be required to identify and isolate active compounds from problematic invasive plant species to develop valuable agrochemicals.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.119-124
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• 2006

Kudzu vine(Pueraria montana var. lobata) is an invasive climbing woody vine that envelops trees and shrubs, pressing physically and shutting out sunlight, which needs to be controlled. Kudzu vine pathogens were surveyed as a way to seek its biocontrol agents in 2002. Occurrence of a bacterial halo blight disease of kudzu vine was observed at several localities in Korea including Euiwang and Suwon in Gyeonggi Province, Daejon, and Gochang and Buan in Jeonbuk Province. Symptoms of brown to black spots with a surrounding yellowish halo appeared from June and lasted till the rainy season without much expansion, but accompanying often leaf blight and defoliation. Isolated bacteria were identified as Pseudomonas syringae pv. phaseolicola based on physiological and cultural characteristics, Biolog, fatty acid and 16S rDNA sequencing analyses. In artificial inoculation test, these bacteria produced the same halo spot symptoms on kudzu vine and bean plants. They also induced hypersensitive responses (HR) on tobacco, tomato, and chili pepper leaves. This is the first report of a bacterial disease of kudzu vine in Korea, and the bacterial pathogen can be used as a biocontrol agent against the pest plant.

• Microbiology and Biotechnology Letters
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.311-317
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• 2006

Using PCR amplification, we cloned a cellulase gene (ce/H) from the Bacillus subtilis AH18 which has plant growth-promoting activity and antagonistic ability against pepper blight caused by Phytophthora capsici. The 1.6 kb PCR fragment contained the full sequence of the cellulase gene and the 1,582 bp gene deduced a 508 amino acid sequence. Similarity search in protein database revealed that the cellulase of B. subtilis AH18 was more than 98% homologous in the amino acid sequence to those of several major Bacillus spp. The ce/H was expressed in E. coli under an IPTG inducible lac promoter on the vector, had apparent molecular weight of about 55 kDa upon CMC-SDS-PAGE analysis. Partially purified cellulase had not only cellulolytic activity toward carboxymethyl-cellulose (CMC) but also insoluble cellulose, such as Avicel and filter paper (Whatman No. 1). In addition, the cellulase could degrade a fungal cell wall of Phytophthora capsici. The optimum pH and temperature of the ce/H coded cellulase were determined to be pH 5.0 and $50^{\circ}C$. The enzyme activity was activated by $AgNO_3$ or $CoCl_2$. However its activity was Inhibited by $HgC1_2$. The enzyme activity was activated by hydroxy urea or sodium azide and inhibited by CDTA or EDTA. The results indicate that the cellulase gene, ce/H is an antifungal mechanism of B. subtilis AH18 against phytophthora blight disease in red-pepper.

• The Korean Journal of Pesticide Science
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.463-472
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• 2010

It was conducted to investigate the control efficacy of carboxylic acid amide (CAA) fungicides, such as benthiavalicarb, iprovalicarb, dimethomorph and mandipropamid, against pepper Phytophthora blight caused by P. capsid in the laboratory and the field. The fungicides inhibited mycelial growth and direct sporangium germination of P. capsid strongly, while there was no activity of all fungicides against zoospore release from sporangium. In greenhouse test, they showed the good protective and curative effect against pepper Phytophthora blight. Benthiavalicarb applied at $100{\mu}g\;mL^{-1}$ 7 days before inoculation prevented pepper Phytophthora blight by 100%, even though the zoosporangiurn suspension of P. capsid adjusted to not only $5{\times}10^3$ zoosporangia $mL^{-1}$ but also $1{\times}10^5$ zoosporangia $mL^{-1}$ was inoculated by soil-drenching. Except for dimethomorph, the other fungicides showed an excellent control activity over 2 years from 2009 to 2010 in the field test. The control value of dimethomorph applied at $250{\mu}g\;mL^{-1}$ was low, 27.2% in 2009, but that of dimethomorph applied even at $125{\mu}g\;mL^{-1}$ was high, 89.5% in 2010. All the fungicides showed good inhibitory effect on the mycelial growth and the direct germination of zoosporangiurn, and controlled pepper Phytophthora blight preventively and curatively, can be used to establish the spray system for control1ing the pepper disease.

• Korean Journal of Organic Agriculture
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.117-125
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• 1998

For isolation of antagonistic fungi antagonistic to Phytophthora capsici, a total of 157 isolates of fungi were screened from soil. Among the 157 isolates further screened by the dual culture test on potato dextrose agar and V-8 juice agar, 16 isolates were tested to show their antagonistic activity against P. capsici and Fusarium oxysporum. Fungal cul-ture filtrates of screened 16 isolates were shown to inhibit germination of zoospoorangia of P. capsici entirely and conidia of F. oxysporum considerably. Antagonistic fungi were shown to suppress of P. capsici infection of red-pepper plants maintained in the green house. Four isolates. 27 J5, 37 J10, 36 J13 and 31 K10, with the reduced disease incidence 53.3∼60.0% were identified as Fusarium sp. (27 J5). Trichoderma sp. (37 J10, 36 J13) and Penicillium sp. (31 K10).

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.280-285
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• 2010

In the course of a searching natural antifungal compounds from plant sources, we found that the methanol extract ($3,000\;{\mu}g/ml$) of Malus domestica fruits had potential of control against rice blast (Magnaporthe grisea) and tomato late blight (Phytophthora infestans). Under bioassay-guided purification, we isolated phloretin, a phenolic compound, with in vivo antifungal activity against M. grisea. By 1-day protective application of phloretin ($500\;{\mu}g/ml$), the compound strongly inhibited the disease development of M. grisea and P. infestans on rice and tomato seedlings, respectively. And red pepper anthracnose caused by Colletotrichum coccodes also was moderately suppressed. However, rice sheath blight (Rhizoctonia solani AG1), and barley powdery mildew (Blumeria graminis f. sp. hordei) were hardly controlled. In addition, the compound showed in vitro antifungal activity against some plant pathogenic fungi including Phytophthora capsici, Alternaria panax, Sclerotinia sclerotiorum, R. solani AG4, and M. grisea. This is the first report on the antifungal activity of phloretin against plant pathogenic fungi.

• Research in Plant Disease
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.129-135
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• 2011

Chitosan is a linear polysaccharide composed of randomly distributed ${\ss}$-(1-4)-linked D-glucosamine and Nacetyl-D-glucosamine. There have been many reports on the induced systemic resistance and in vivo antifungal activities of higher molecular weight chitosans with molecular weights over 3,000 amu (atomatic mass unit), but there are few papers on in vivo antifungal activities of low molecular weight chitosans (oligochitosans) with molecular weights less than 3,000 amu. In our study, an oligochitosan sample (320.3,000 amu) showed a potent 1-day protective activity with control values more than 94% at concentrations of 500 and 1,000 ${\mu}g$/ml especially against tomato late blight caused by Phytophthora infestans under growth chamber conditions. It also displayed a moderate 1-day protective activity with control values of 67.89% at concentrations of 500 and 1,000 ${\mu}g$/ml against wheat leaf rust and red pepper anthracnose. On the other hand, it showed a 16-hr curative activity against red pepper anthracnose, but not against tomato late blight and wheat leaf rust. In field experiments, oligochitosan effectively suppressed the development of late blight on potato and tomato plants with control values of 72% and 48%, respectively. The results strongly indicate that oligochitosan can be used as an eco-friendly organic material for the control of late blight on tomato and potato plants.