Contrasting Genomic Diversity in Two Closely Related Postharvest Pathogens: Penicillium digitatum and Penicillium expansum.

ABSTRACT: Penicillium digitatum and Penicillium expansum are two closely related fungal plant pathogens causing green and blue mold in harvested fruit, respectively. The two species differ in their host specificity, being P. digitatum restricted to citrus fruits and P. expansum able to infect a wide range of fruits after harvest. Although host-specific Penicillium species have been found to have a smaller gene content, it is so far unclear whether these different host specificities impact genome variation at the intraspecific level. Here we assessed genome variation across four P. digitatum and seven P. expansum isolates from geographically distant regions. Our results show very high similarity (average 0.06 SNPs [single nucleotide polymorphism] per kb) between globally distributed isolates of P. di

SUBMITTER: Julca I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4758248 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature