Infected wheat kernels used in innoculation for Fusarium head blight screening
A CIMMYT research assistant displays maize kernels that have been infected with Fusarium graminearum (teleomorph Gibberella zeae) in the lab, during artificial inoculation of an experimental wheat plot at the center’s headquarters at El Batán, Mexico. Inoculation ensures a high disease pressure to enable scientists to study resistance to Fusarium head blight (FHB), and one technique is to spread these infected kernels in the field, allowing the dispersal of ascospores, one of the two types of spores produced by the fungus. However, this method is somewhat complicated and can be unreliable, and is no longer used in CIMMYT. Instead, a CO2-driven backpack sprayer is used at flowering to deliver a liquid inoculum of F. graminearum conidia, the other type of spore, which are easily produced in the lab in large quantities. CIMMYT screens several thousand wheat lines for FHB resistance every year. Resistant materials are the result of ongoing breeding efforts, and may be used further in CIMMYT’s breeding program or enter international nurseries like the Fusarium head blight screening nursery (FHBSN).
Photo credit: Janet Lewis/CIMMYT.
Infected wheat kernels used in innoculation for Fusarium head blight screening
A CIMMYT research assistant displays maize kernels that have been infected with Fusarium graminearum (teleomorph Gibberella zeae) in the lab, during artificial inoculation of an experimental wheat plot at the center’s headquarters at El Batán, Mexico. Inoculation ensures a high disease pressure to enable scientists to study resistance to Fusarium head blight (FHB), and one technique is to spread these infected kernels in the field, allowing the dispersal of ascospores, one of the two types of spores produced by the fungus. However, this method is somewhat complicated and can be unreliable, and is no longer used in CIMMYT. Instead, a CO2-driven backpack sprayer is used at flowering to deliver a liquid inoculum of F. graminearum conidia, the other type of spore, which are easily produced in the lab in large quantities. CIMMYT screens several thousand wheat lines for FHB resistance every year. Resistant materials are the result of ongoing breeding efforts, and may be used further in CIMMYT’s breeding program or enter international nurseries like the Fusarium head blight screening nursery (FHBSN).
Photo credit: Janet Lewis/CIMMYT.