Molecular epidemiology of forest pathogens: from genes to landscape

Abstract

In the last two decades, important developments in molecular biology have significantly improved our capacity to address questions in population biology, which could have an impact on our understanding of the epidemiology of plant pathogens. In turn, some of the molecular tools that are now available, in particular those based on the polymerase chain reaction, have made it possible to detect and monitor pathogens directly from the environment, by-passing the need for culturing. This has had a large impact in forest pathology, where hosts and pathogens often cover large ranges of latitude, longitude, and altitude. Genomics data as well are being generated in forest pathology, with fungal and tree genomes being completely sequenced. The integration of genomic and environmental data is a promising area of forest pathology, and this review will address some of the issues and potential future directions in this field.

Keywords:

• population genetics
• diagnostics
• polymerase chain reaction
• fungal genomics
• community profiling
• forest pathology