An Optimised Greenhouse Protocol for Screening Banana Plants for Fusarium Wilt Resistance

Abstract

Fusarium wilt, caused by the soil-borne fungus Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. cubense (Foc), is considered one of the most devastating diseases of banana in the world. Effective management of Fusarium wilt is only achieved by planting banana varieties resistant to Foc. Resistant bananas, however, require many years of breeding and field-testing under multiple geographical conditions. Field evaluation is reliable but time consuming and expensive. Small plant screening methods are, therefore, needed to speed up the evaluation of banana varieties for Foc resistance. To this end, a small plant screening method for resistance to banana Fusarium wilt is presented. The method proposes the planting of 2- to 3-month-old banana plants in soil amended with 10 g Foc-colonised millet seeds. Rhizome discoloration is then evaluated to rank the disease resistance response. The optimized millet seed technique could be useful in mass screening of newly developed genotypes for resistance to Foc.

Pathogenicity and Molecular Analysis of Fusarium Isolates in Nendran and Grand Naine

“…In this experiment, the wilting symptoms developed after 3 weeks which is earlier by one week, as against 4 weeks period reported for the development of infection by Thangavel et al [15]. The disease severity was measured in susceptible banana variety after 50 percent yellowing symptoms occurred and the duration ranged from 6-12 weeks post inoculation [16]. In our study, we assessed the severity of the disease in 3 weeks post inoculation.…”