• Mycobiology
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• v.51 no.3
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• pp.178-185
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• 2023

The cell wall integrity (CWI) signaling pathway plays important roles in the dissemination and infection of several plant pathogenic fungi. However, its roles in the pepper fruit anthracnose fungus Colletotrichum scovillei remain uninvestigated. In this study, the major components of the CWI signaling pathway-CsMCK1 (MAPKKK), CsMKK1 (MAPKK), and CsMPS1 (MAPK)-were functionally characterized in C. scovillei via homology-dependent gene replacement. The ΔCsmck1, DCsmkk1, and ΔCsmps1 mutants showed impairments in fungal growth, conidiation, and tolerance to CWI and salt stresses. Moreover, ΔCsmck1, ΔCsmkk1, and ΔCsmps1 failed to develop anthracnose disease on pepper fruits due to defects in appressorium formation and invasive hyphae growth. These results suggest that CsMCK1, CsMKK1, and CsMPS1 play important roles in mycelial growth, conidiation, appressorium formation, plant infection, and stress adaption of C. scovillei. These findings will contribute to a better understanding of the roles of the CWI signaling pathway in the development of pepper fruit anthracnose disease.

• Research in Plant Disease
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.120-123
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• 2002

Occurrence of anthracnose on red pepper fruit was examined at 6 red pepper-growing regions including Yecheon, Andong, Euisong, Cheongsong, and Ponghwa in Kyungbuk province, Korea in 1999. The disease occurred firstly June 13 at Cheongsong, progressed gradually thereafteri and increased rapidly from late August. The average disease incidence with mid September was 30.4%. There was no significant difference in disease incidence among the regions examined. Correlation coefficient analysis of the disease incidence with weather factors revealed that it was significantly related to relative humidity, precipitation, rainy days, and duration of continuous rainy days. Most fungal isolates from the diseased fruit were Colletotichum gloeosporioides. In the in field experiment, unmature fruit was somewhat more susceptible to the disease than mature fruit. In the field experiment, the disease occurred severely in open fields, having the disease incidence of 12.1%; however, no disease was observed in the rain-proof fields. The anthracnose on red pepper fruit developed earlier and more severely in the successive cropping field with red pepper than the field having other crops. Removal of infected plant debris also delayed and reduced the disease occurrence, suggesting that plant debris infested with the anthracnose fungus serve as a primary inoculum source which may govern the severity of the disease in the field.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.269-277
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• 2015

Anthracnose caused by Colletotrichum gloeosporioides has been destructive during pepper fruit production in outdoor fields in Korea. In vitro antifungal activities of 15 different plant essential oils or its components were evaluated during conidial germination and mycelial growth of C. gloeosporioides. In vitro conidial germination was most drastically inhibited by vapour treatments with carvacrol, cinnamon oil, trans-cinnamaldehyde, citral, p-cymene and linalool. Inhibition of the mycelial growth by indirect vapour treatment with essential oils was also demonstrated compared with untreated control. Carvacrol, cinnamon oil, trans-cinnamaldehyde, citral and eugenol were among the most inhibitory plant essential oils by the indirect antifungal efficacies. Plant protection efficacies of the plant essential oils were demonstrated by reduced lesion diameter on the C. gloeosporioides-inoculated immature green pepper fruits compared to the inoculated control fruits without any plant essential oil treatment. In planta test showed that all plant essential oils tested in this study demonstrated plant protection efficacies against pepper fruit anthracnose with similar levels. Thus, application of different plant essential oils can be used for ecofriendly disease management of anthracnose during pepper fruit production.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.154-167
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• 2013

We previously developed a sequential screening procedure to select antagonistic bacterial strains against Phytophthora capsici in pepper plants. In this study, we used a modified screening procedure to select effective biocontrol strains against P. capsici; we evaluated the effect of selected strains on Phytophthora blight and anthracnose occurrence and fruit yield in pepper plants under field and plastic house conditions from 2007 to 2009. We selected four potential biocontrol strains (Pseudomonas otitidis YJR27, P. putida YJR92, Tsukamurella tyrosinosolvens YJR102, and Novosphingobium capsulatum YJR107) among 239 bacterial strains. In the 3-year field tests, all the selected strains significantly (P < 0.05) reduced Phytophthora blight without influencing rhizosphere microbial populations; they showed similar or better levels of disease suppressions than in metalaxyl treatment in the 2007 and 2009 tests, but not in the 2008 test. In the 2-year plastic house tests, all the selected strains significantly (P < 0.05) reduced anthracnose incidence in at least one of the test years, but their biocontrol activities were variable. In addition, strains YJR27, YJR92, and YJR102, in certain harvests, increased pepper fruit numbers in field tests and red fruit weights in plastic house tests. Taken together, these results indicate that the screening procedure is rapid and reliable for the selection of potential biocontrol strains against P. capsici in pepper plants. In addition, these selected strains exhibited biocontrol activities against anthracnose, and some of the strains showed plant growth-promotion activities on pepper fruit.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.345-354
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• 2022

NADPH oxidase (Nox) complexes are known to play essential roles in differentiation and proliferation of many filamentous fungi. However, the functions of Noxs have not been elucidated in Colletotrichum species. Therefore, we set out to characterize the roles of Nox enzymes and their regulators in Colletotrichum scovillei, which causes serious anthracnose disease on pepper fruits in temperate and subtropical and temperate region. In this study, we generated targeted deletion mutants for CsNox1, CsNox2, CsNoxR, and CsNoxD via homologous recombination. All deletion mutants were normal in mycelial growth, conidiation, conidial germination, and appressorium formation, suggesting that CsNox1, CsNox2, CsNoxR, and CsNoxD are not involved in those developmental processes. Notably, conidia of 𝜟Csnox2 and 𝜟Csnoxr, other than 𝜟Csnox1 and 𝜟Csnoxd, failed to cause anthracnose on intact pepper fruits. However, they still caused normal disease on wounded pepper fruits, suggesting that Csnox2 and CsnoxR are essential for penetration-related morphogenesis in C. scovillei. Further observation proved that 𝜟Csnox2 and 𝜟Csnoxr were unable to form penetration peg, while they fully developed appressoria, revealing that defect of anthracnose development by 𝜟Csnox2 and 𝜟Csnoxr resulted from failure in penetration peg formation. Our results suggest that CsNox2 and CsNoxR are critical for appressorium-mediated penetration in C. scovillei-pepper fruit pathosystem, which provides insight into understanding roles of Nox genes in anthracnose disease development.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.37 no.6
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• pp.607-618
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• 2021

The pepper anthracnose fungus, Colletotrichum scovillei, causes severe losses of pepper fruit production in the tropical and temperate zones. RAC1 is a highly conserved small GTP-binding protein in the Rho GT-Pase family. This protein has been demonstrated to play a role in fungal development, and pathogenicity in several plant pathogenic fungi. However, the functional roles of RAC1 are not characterized in C. scovillei causing anthracnose on pepper fruits. Here, we generated a deletion mutant (𝜟Csrac1) via homologous recombination to investigate the functional roles of CsRAC1. The 𝜟Csrac1 showed pleiotropic defects in fungal growth and developments, including vegetative growth, conidiogenesis, conidial germination and appressorium formation, compared to wild-type. Although 𝜟Csrac1 was able to develop appressoria, it failed to differentiate appressorium pegs. However, 𝜟Csrac1 still caused anthracnose disease with significantly reduced rate on wounded pepper fruits. Further analyses revealed that 𝜟Csrac1 was defective in tolerance to oxidative stress and suppression of host-defense genes. Taken together, our results suggest that CsRAC1 plays essential roles in fungal development and pathogenicity in C. scovilleipepper fruit pathosystem.

• Korean Journal of Organic Agriculture
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.649-660
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• 2018

To control the pepper anthracnose caused by Colletotrichum acutatum, antifungal bacterium strains which was selected among bacterium from natural soil, was tested the antimicrobial activity against various pathogens and its control efficacy on anthracnose disease in the fields. We confirmed that antagonistic activity of CAB13001 strain to pathogens such as Sclerotinia cepivorum, Sclerotinia sclerotium and Botrytis cinerea including Colletotrichum acutatum was remarkable superior with the dual culture method in the artificial medium. In vitro bioassay using the green pepper fruit, CAB13001 strain suppressed the lesion development of Anthracnose disease, and its control value compared to the untreated one was 82.4% on pepper fruit in field test. These results suggested that CAB13001 strain could be a very useful biological control agents to anthracnose disease caused by air born plant pathogens of pepper. By the way, analysis of nucleotide sequence of the gene 16S rDNA, antagonistic bacterium CAB13001 strain used in this study was identified as Burkholderia lata.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.128-135
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• 2009

The survival of Colletotrichum acutatum was investigated in soil, infected fruits, and infected fruit debris incorporated into soil at several temperatures with different soil moisture levels. Samples were examined at 2-week intervals for 18 weeks to determine the survival of the pathogen based on the number of colony forming unit (CFU) of C. acutatum recovered on a semi-selective medium. C. acutatum conidia survived in both sterile and non-sterile soil at 4 and $10^{\circ}C$ for 18 weeks. If infected pepper fruits were completely dried, C. acutatum survived for 18 weeks at temperature from 4 to $20^{\circ}C$. Soil temperature and moisture affected the survival of C. acutatum in infected fruit debris incorporated into soil after air-drying. The effect of soil moisture on survival was weaker at low temperatures than at high temperatures. For up to 16 weeks, conidia were recovered from fruit debris in soil that had been kept at 4 to $20^{\circ}C$ and below 6% soil moisture. Conidia were recovered from fields until approximately 6 months after pepper fruits were harvested. Using PCR with species-specific primers and a pathogenicity test, we identified conidia recovered from soil and infected fruit from both the laboratory and field as C. acutatum and as the primary inoculum causing pepper anthracnose.

• Korean Journal of Organic Agriculture
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• v.19 no.spc
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• pp.291-294
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• 2011

We studies a model for management of pepper anthracnose based covering method and spraying system in field. 1. Among 82 organic fungicides, 42 materials showed most effective inhibition against mycelia growth of the Colletotrichum acutatum in vitro. 23 formulated biocontrol agents were chosen to control the disease from 42 biocontrol agents in greenhouse. In the end, five kinds (2 plant extracts, 2 biopesiticides, 1 Bordeaux mixture) were selected from 23 materials in the field. 2. The mulching materials of bed covering in fruit season were thin non-woven fabric sheet and black plastic. The use of a fabric sheet was reduced the spread of anthracnose as compared to the plastic covering. 3. The application with the chosen materials was reduced 34% of anthracnose for 7 times sprays to planting 70 days as compared to the untreated control. In yield, nonwoven fabric sheet with formulated biopesticides was increased 17% than black plastic. 4. This result indicated that the developed biocontrol strategy could be an effective and economic crop protection system in organic pepper cultivation field.

• Journal of Crop Science and Biotechnology
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.13-16
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• 2008

Pepper fruit anthracnose caused by Colletotrichum species is an economically important disease that causes serious yield loss and quality deterioration in many Asian countries including South Korea and Taiwan. Recently, Capsicum baccatum PI594137 was found to exhibit broad-spectrum resistance to Colletotrichum acutatum. The inheritance of anthracnose resistance to C. acutatum was analyzed in an intraspecific population derived from a cross between C. baccatum Golden-aji and PI594137. Detached mature green fruits were inoculated using the microinjection method. The disease response was evaluated as the disease incidence and the overall lesion diameter at 7 days after inoculation(DAI). The segregation ratios of resistance and susceptibility to C. acutatum in the $F_2$ and $BC_s$ populations significantly fit a 3:1 Mendelian model. This result indicates that the resistance of PI594137 to C. acutatum is controlled by a single dominant gene.