ARS | Publication request: Genetic diversity and population differentiation of natural populations of Sclerotinia sclerotiorum on lentils in eastern Washington.

Submitted to: Phytopathology
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: March 15, 2007
Publication Date: August 1, 2007
Citation: Wang, X., Chen, W. 2007. Genetic diversity and population differentiation of natural populations of Sclerotinia sclerotiorum on lentils in eastern Washington.. Phytopathology.

Technical Abstract: Genetic diversity and population differentiation of natural populations of Sclerotinia sclerotiorum on lentils in eastern Washington. X. Wang and W. Chen. Washington State University, Pullman, WA, and USDA-ARS, Pullman, WA 99163 Sclerotinia sclerotiorum is the causal agent of white mold on lentils. Many studies on population structure of S. sclerotiorum have shown that this pathogen is primarily clonal with clear clonal lineages dominate each population. However, there is no study on S. sclerotiorum populations on lentils. In this study using microsatellite markers and mycelial compatibility grouping, we examined the genetic diversity and population differentiation of four natural populations of S. sclerotiorum on lentils from eastern Washington collected in 2003 and 2005. A total of 18 microsatellite markers were tested and 11 of those were polymorphic among all the isolates. The number of alleles for the polymorphic markers ranged from 2 to 7. The average gene diversity for the four populations ranged from 0.53 to 0.67. Most isolates have unique genotypes and MCGs. Forty-six MCGs and 53 hyplotypes were found in a total of 69 isolates, and hyplotypes were consistent with MCGs in most cases. Genetic distance values in pairwise comparisons among the four populations ranged from 0.01 to 0.08, and four of the six pairwise comparisons were significant (p< 0.05). Populations were differentiated by both location and collection year.