ASSIGNMENT # 1

PUCCINIA GRAMINIS

The Pathogen:
Puccinia graminis, Puccinia graminis is a macrocyclic, heteroecious rust fungus producing
spermagonia and aecia on barberry uredia and telia on wheat, other cereals and grasses.

Development of Disease:
In cooler regions the fungus overwinters as teliospores on infected wheat debris. Teliospores
germinate in the spring and produce a basidium on which form four basidiospores. The
basidiospores are ejected forcefully into the air and are carried by air currents for a few hundred
meters. Basidiospores landing on young barberry leaves germinate and penetrate the epidermal
cells. After that, the mycelium grows mostly intercellularly. Within 3 or 4 days the mycelium
develops into a spermagonium, which ruptures the epidermis and its opening emerges on the
surface of the plant tissue. Receptive hyphae from the spermagonium extend beyond the
opening, and spermatia embedded in a sticky liquid are exuded through the opening. Visiting
insects become smeared with spermatia and carry them to other spermagonia. Spermatia may
also be spread by rain-water or dew running off the plant surface. When a spermatium comes in
contact with a receptive hypha of a compatible spermagonium, fertilization takes place. The
nucleus of the spermatium passes into the receptive hypha, but it does not fuse with the nucleus
already present in the latter. Instead, it migrates through the cells of the monokaryotic
mycelium, dividing as it progresses to the aecial mother cells. Thus, the dikaryotic condition is
reestablished, and mycelium andaeciospores formed subsequently are dikaryotic. This mycelium
then grows intercellularly toward the lower side of the leaf, where it forms thick mycelial mats
that develop into aecia. In the meantime, host cells surrounding the mycelium are stimulated to
enlarge; this, along with the increased volume of the fungus, results in a swelling of the infected
area on the lower surface of the leaf.

Symptoms:
The pathogen causing stem rust of wheat attacks and produces symptoms on wheat, related
cereals (barley, oats, rye), grasses and on plants of common barberry (Berberis vulgaris) and
certain other related species. The symptoms on wheat appear as elliptical blisters or pustules,
known as uredia, that develop parallel with the long axis of the stem, leaf, or leaf sheath.
Blisters may also appear on the neck and glumes of the wheat spike. The epidermis covering the
pustules is later ruptured irregularly and pushed back, revealing a powdery mass of brick red-
colored uredospores. The uredia vary in size from 1 to 3 millimeters wide by 10 millimeters long.
Later in the season, as the plant approaches maturity, the pustules turn black as the fungus
produces teliospores instead of uredospores and uredia are transformed into black telia.
Sometimes telia may develop independently of uredia. Uredia and telia may exist on wheat
plants in such great numbers that large parts of the plant appear to be covered with the
ruptured areas which are filled with the rust-red uredospores, the black teliospores, or both.

Control:
The most effective, and the only practical, means of control of wheat stem rust is through the
use of wheat varieties resistant to infection by the pathogen. A tremendous amount of work is
being done on the development of wheat varieties resistant to existing races of the fungus. The
best varieties of wheat that combine rust resistance and desirable agronomic characteristics are
recommended annually by the agricultural experiment stations and change periodically in order
to evade the existing rust races. Much effort is now directed toward the development of
varieties with general or partial resistance and toward the development of multiline cultivars.
Eradication of barberry has reduced losses from stem rust by eliminating the early season
infections on wheat in areas where uredospores cannot overwinter, by reducing the opportunity
for the development of new races of the stem rust fungus through genetic recombination on
barberry. This provides for greater stability in the race population of the pathogen and
contributes to the success of breeding of resistant varieties.
Several fungicides can effectively control the stem rust of wheat. In most cases, however, 4 to
10 applications per season are required for complete control of the rust; because of the low
income return per acre of wheat, such a control program is not economically practical. Two
applications of some fungicides, coordinated with forecasts of weather conditions favoring rust
epidemics, may reduce damage from stem rust by as much as 75%.
These chemicals, which have both protective and eradicative properties, and therefore even two
sprays, one at trace to 5% rust prevalence and the second 10 to 14 days later, can give an
economically rewarding control of rust.
Certain systemic fungicides also control stem rust when applied as one or two sprays 1 to 3
weeks apart during the early stages of disease development. Seed treatments with some
systemic chemicals inhibit early but not late season infections.
Damage by the stem rust fungus is usually lower fields in which heavy fertilization with nitrate
forms nitrogen and dense seeding have been avoided.