History of Plant Pathology

Pl. Path. 111 (Cr. Hrs. 3+1)

P.N. Sharma

Department of Plant Pathology,

CSK HPKV, Palampur (H.P.)

Amos (about 750B.C.) was so

steeped in mysticism while

writing the Bible.

Romans created two Gods for

dreaded Rust – “Robigo and

Robigus”.

On 25th April – Robigalia - a special

holiday

Theophrastus (200 B.C.) observed

that plant disease were worse in

low spots than on high grounds

Ancient times

Albertus Magnus (1200 A.D.) conceived the idea that

mistletoe is a parasite, the breakthrough should have opened

whole new world to be conquered

From 1600 - 1800 Antony Van Leeuwenhoek (1675) –

Microscope

John Needham (1749) observed the appearance of organisms– concluded that microorganisms originated from meat.

Spallanzani boiled beef broth and sealed the flasks- no microbes appeared.

In 1725, Connecticut farmers- eradicated barberry and protected wheat from rust

Micheli (1729) Father of Mycology

Nova Plantarum Genera – described many new genera of fungi, their reproductive structures

Observed a second generation of spores when sown on sterile slices of melon

M. Tillet (1755) – inoculated wheat seeds with dust of smut, crop grew smutty. Beautiful experiment didn't convince the botanists

Prevost (1807) – Repeated the Tillet’s experiment and proved that bunt of wheat is caused by fungus, studied the germination of smut spores and their inhibition by adding CuSo4

Golden era (1800 – 1900)

Devastating epidemic,

the Late blight (1845) in

Ireland dramatized the

effect of plant diseases

on human suffering

besides stimulated

interest in their cause

and control

(1 million people died)

Plant Pathogens Anton de Bary (1831 – 1888) In 1853

established that rust and smuts are causes

not the results of disease, studied

development of many smut and rust fungus.

1874, Woronin - discovered a new type of

parasite on Crucifer & called Molds Later

named- Plasmodiophora brassicae

Thomas T.J. Burill (1880) – Fire blight of

apple and pear is caused by bacterium.

Adolf Mayer (1886) – infectious nature of sap

from tobacco mosaic infected plants, gave

term Mosaikrankheit means mosaic

M. W. Beijerinck (1898) – finally gave the term

virus named them as Contagium vivum fluidum

(Father of Virology)

Lafont in 1909; protozoa associated with

Euphorbia plants , later Stahel found flagellate

protozoa infecting the phloem of coffee trees

Plant Pathogens Needham (1743) in England found

association of nematodes with wheat galls

(Anguina tritici)

Doi et. al. (1967) – MLO (Phytoplasma) with

potato witches broom

T. O. Diener (1971) –Viroid associated with

PSTVd

Windsor and Black, 1972: Rickettsiae

Hoseloff and Symons (1982) – discovered

virusoids associated tobacco velvet mosaic

disease

Prions were proposed for the first time in

1972 by Prusiner (Nobel Prize in Physiology

or Medicine in 1997)

Anton de bary (1831 – 1888) – the father of

plant pathology,

In 1853 he established that rust and smuts

are causes not the results of disease,

studied development of many smut and

rust

Debary’s students: Woronin, Brefeld, Millardet, Ward &

Farlow, Julius Gotthelf Kuhn.

In 1866, He published his Text book – Morphology and

Physiology of fungi, Lichens and Myxomycetes

In 1886 published Physiology of Parasitism - sclerotina;

rotting of vegetables

1861 Finally proved the cause of blight as Phytophthora

infestans by inoculating potato with sporangia

In 1865, reported Heteroecism in Uradinales

J. G. Kuhn (1858) published the book – Diseases of Cultivated Crops, their Causes and Control – first book in which fungi were regarded as the causal factors

Pasture (April 7th 1864) – irritated with spontaneous theory performed experiments that ended the arguments for all time

Robert Koch (1875) in 1887:

Koch’s postulates: Proof of

pathogenicity

Oscar Brefeld (1875,1883)

Pure culture Technique of Micro-org.

Also studied cereal smuts in detail

Downy mildew of grapes (1878 –

1885)

P. M.A. Millardet (1885) –

Bordeaux mixture

E.C. Stakman (1913) –

phenomenon of Physiological

specialization in rusts

HOST - PARASITE RELATIONSHIP

William Brown(1912) – Role of enzymes to disintegrate plant tissue

Tanaka (1933) – First toxin to be recognized from A. kikuchiana

Muller and Borger (1940) – coined term “Phytoalexin”and the theory in 1941

Meeham and Murphy (1947) - victorin from H. victoriae J. C. Walker(1931)– Biochemical basis of disease

resistance Waggoner (1953) – Coined the terms “phytotoxin” and

“pathotoxin” Van Loon (1985) – Isolated first pathogenesis related proteins (PR protein) Ross (1961) – Coined the term SAR, resistance that developed in the untreated portion of TMV inoculated plants

Robert Hartig (1839-1901) : worked on diseases of forest trees and crowned with title of “Father of Forest Pathology”

In 1874: book Important Diseases of Forest trees

In 1882: Text Book of Tree Diseases

Bacteriology

•Thomas T. Burill (1880) – Fire blight of apple and pear is caused by bacterium, Erwin F. Smith (father of bacteriology) • published bulletins – “ Wilt diseases of cotton,

Watermelon and cowpea” ( 1889)

• Panama disease, banana(1910)

• E. tracheiphilus and its transmission

• P. malvacearum

• Crown gall – relationship with human cancer (1907)

• Beergey’s Manual of determinative bacteriology

Viruses

Seventeenth century – “tulipomania”

Adolf Mayer (1886) – for the first time reported the infectious nature of the sap from tobacco mosaic infected plants and he gave the term Mosaikrankheit means mosaic

Ivanoviski (1892) – Sap retained infectivity even after filtration through chamberland, doubted toxin produced by bacterium

M. W. Beijerinck (1898) – finally gave the term virus named them as Contagium vivum fluidum (Father of Virology)

H. Purdy (1929) – Virus infected plants contained antigenic material,

opened new door in plant virology

W. M. Stanley (1935) – “Isolation of crystalline protein

possessing the properties of TMV” Shared Nobel prize 1946

Bawden and Pirie (1937) – reported the nucleoprotein

nature of TMV,

Kausche et. al., (1939) – First electron microscope

picture of TMV

Fukushi (1940) – Transovarial transmission of rice dwarf virus

Kassanis (1962) – coined the term Satellite virus, associated with

TNV

Harrison et.al.,(1970)

Classified the plant viruses into 16 groups (1971)

Coined the term Geminiviruses (1976)

Taylor and Robertson (1970)- Nematode

transmission

Kohler and Milstein (1975) – “ Hybridoma

technology” used in monoclonal antibody

production– Nobel prize in 1984

Clark and Adams (1977) ELISA in plant virus detection; developed DAS-ELISA

Symons & Keese (1982) – discovered virusoids

Powell-Abel et al (1986) – C.P. mediated resistance in TMV.

Disease Resistance Biffen (1905) – reported that resistance in two wheat

varieties to yellow rust was inherited in Mendelian fashion to its progeny.

Barrus (1911) showed genetic variability with in pathogen species i.e. different pathogen races are restricted to certain varieties of a host species.

Later in 1914 Stakman: established this phenomenon in wheat rust and showed that these races can be distinguished by their ability to infect different varieties with in a set of host differential varieties.

Flor (1946) – working with flax rust came with gene-for-gene hypothesis

Gauman (1946) gave the concept of hypersensitivity

Vanderplank (1963) – “vertical and horizontal resistance” ; book in 1963 “Plant Disease: Epidemics and Control”

Albersheim and Anderson (1975) – the first comprehensive model for gene for gene interaction “Surface carbohydrate elicitor receptor model”

Keen (1975) coined the term Elicitor Keen and Bruegger (1971) “ Elicitor

Receptor Model” Dixon et al (1996) – first cloned the Avr2

gene from tomato (Cladosporium fulvum) more than 20 Avr genes have been cloned since

Johal and Brigg (1992) – First cloned the resistance Hm1 gene from maize,

Genetics of the Host and the Pathogen

Plant disease control Millardet (1885) – Bordeaux mixture

Reihm (1913) – Uspulum for control of bunt. In 1913,

organic mercury compounds; later banned because of

their toxicity.

Tisdale and Williams (1934) – Dithiocarbamic acid

derivatives fungicides ( ferbam, zineb etc.)

Von-Schmeling and Marshal Kulka (1966) – 1st systemic fungicide- carboxin

New & Kerr (1972): 1st biological control of bacterial disease: Crown gall using avirulent strain of Agrobacterium radiobacter.

(Schuster et. al.1990,: Ruess et. al., 1995) Recently developed the Novel fungicides known as “plant activators”.

Rachel Carson (1962) – Silent Spring,

described the dangers of polluting

the environment

History of plant pathology in India Indian (Imperial) Agricultural institute at Pusa, Bihar (1905)

E. J. Butler- First Mycologist (Father of Indian Plant Pathology)

Book- Fungi and Diseases in Plants

Monograph on potato disease, wilt of cotton, rice, sugarcane diseases & cereal rusts

K.C. Mehta (1929) – monographic on annual recurrence of black stem rust of wheat

K.R.Kirtikar- 1st Indian to study fungi

Mitra (1931) - Karnal bunt on wheat

Luthra and Sattar (1934) – Solar heat treatment for loose smut

Bengal famine 1942 caused by Brown spot disease of rice

B.B. Mundkar (1948) - Indian Phytopathological society in 1947- Started Journal Indian Phytopathology in 1949; wrote a book -Fungi and Plant diseases

Dastur (1948) – described two new diseases of potato; leaf rot and tuber rot - Phytophthora parasitica

M. K. Patel (1948) – Established school of plant bacteriology Poona

M. K. Patel, V. P. Bhide and G. Rangaswamy- bacterial diseases

Thirumalachar- Smuts and rust- Aerofungin.

S. N. Dasgupta (1956) – Role of enzymes in pathogenicity

T.S. Sadasivan and his school developed concept of vivotoxins; mechanism of cotton wilt.

S.P. Raychaudhury Virologist

Phytopathological classics

These are the reprints of outstanding research papers published in non English journals, not available in most of the Libraries of the world

Have been translated in English

15 in Number

Phytopathological classics 1. Fabricius – Attempt at a Dissertation on the Disease of

plants. Ravn (1774)

2. Fontana – Observation on Rust of Grain 1767. Pirone (1932)

3. Millardet – the discovery of Bordeaux Mixture 1885. Schneiderhan (1933)

4. Woronin – Plasmodiophora brassicae, the Cause of the Cabbage Hernia 1878. Charles Chupp (1934)

5. Tillet – Disseretation on the Cause of the Corruption and Smutting of the Kernels of Wheat in the Head ( and on the means of preventing these untoward circumstances) 1755. Humphrey (1937)

6. Prevost – Memoir on the Immediate Cause of Bunt or Smut of Wheat, and on the Prevention of Bunt 1807. Keitt (1939)

7. Mayer (1886), Ivanowski (1892), Beijerinck (1898) and Baurb (1904) – three early papers on tobacco mosaic and one on infectious variegation. James Johnson (1942)

8. Berkeley – Observations, Botinical and Physiological, on the Potato Murrain 1846. also includes selections from Berkeley’sv “Vegetable Pathology” made by the Plant Pathology Committee of Britsh Mycological Society.1948

9. Targioni Tozzeti – True Nature and Sad Effects of the Rust and Other Maladies of Wheat and of Oats in the Field1767. Tehon (1952)

10. Bassi – Del Mal del Segno 1835. Yarrow (1958)

11.De Bary – Investigations of the Brangd Fungi and the Diseases of Plants Caused by Them With Reference to Grain and Other Useful Plants 1853. Arny and Moore (1969)

12. Harting – Important Diseases of Forest Trees 1874. detailed reporte which established the microbial basis for wood decay. (Merrill et.al.,(1975)

13.Fischer/Smith – The Fischer Smith Controversy: Are Their Bacterial Diseases of Plants? 1899. Seven articles depict vthe classic and bitter debate regarding the existence of bacterial diseases of plants. Cambell (1981)

14. Ando/ Fukushi/ Storey – Viruses In Vectors: Transovarial Passage and Retention. Classic papers on plant viruses and their insect vectors 1986.

15. Dutch Elm Disease – Original 11 Articles. That laid the foundation for studying the devastating disease. Research by 7 female Dutch scientists from 1920 - 1935

Scope & Importance of plant diseases

Scopes & Importance of Plant Diseases

Plant pathology deals with different aspects of plant diseases and has wide scope than human pathology which only deal with only one aspect

In recent years plant pathologists have begun to specialize in particular aspect. The field in which notable advances have been made are:

Interaction between host and pathogen at chemical, molecular and genetic level

Plant virology, chemistry of fungitoxicity

Disease forecasting

On practical aspects much advances have been made in plant protection chemicals; breeding for disease resistance

Increased population emphasizes the application of all possible means to meet the food requirements

Expansion of crop area

Improved methods of cultivation

Increased use of fertilizers

Improved varieties

Increased irrigation

Crop protection

Importance of Plant Diseases

Late blight of potato-1841-51 (Irish famine)

Coffee rust 1867-1870 (Srilanka)

Downy mildew of grapes (1880s) (France)

Bengal Famine 1942 (India)

Bacterial Blight of Rice 1963 (Bihar)

Southern corn leaf blight -1970 (USA)

Estimated annual losses worldwide

Diseases 14.1%

Insects 10.2%

Weeds 12.2%

Total av. looses 36.5%

Losses are more in developing world

and

less in develop world

Losses caused by Plant Diseases

“The 21st century will prove to be a fort of

strength for plant pathology, a fountain

head of knowledge where students will

drink, and the waters of which will wet the

dry lands of the whole world”

Acknowledgements

I gratefully acknowledge the use of some very important photographs given in text book “Plant Pathology” by G N Agrios.

I also acknowledge the scientists who spent valuable time in generating information on various aspects of plant pathology and displayed the same on internet for use by students, teachers and researchers

Lecture dedicated to respected “G N Agrios”