PJB-2024-190
COFFEA ARABICA WILT DISEASE ASSOCIATED WITH FUSARIUM SOLANI AND FUSARIUM EQUISETI AND ITS IMPACT ON THE ANATOMY OF COFFEE ROOTS IN SAUDI ARABIA
MOHAMMED OBAID ALSHAHARNI
Abstract
Fusarium-induced wilt has a major impact on the coffee industry. The internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region is commonly used as a DNA barcode to evaluate Fusarium diversity. Our objective was to identify the pathogen responsible for Coffea arabica wilt, using both morphological and molecular methods, and to investigate its effects on coffee root anatomy. Symptomatic wilting leaves and roots were collected from three locations Asir region, Saudi Arabia. The infected samples were cultured on potato dextrose agar media at 25°C for 3-4 days, resulting in two fungal colonies. DNA was extracted from the isolated pathogens and amplified via PCR using ITS1 and ITS4 primers. PCR product sequences were submitted to GenBank and were assigned accession numbers OR602864 and OR602865. The sequences had lengths of 537 bp and 519 bp, respectively. GenBank homology identified the two fungi as Fusarium solani and Fusarium equiseti with 99% and 98% similarity, respectively. Our investigation revealed the presence of previously unreported fungal species associated with coffee wilt in Saudi Arabia. Anatomical examinations have confirmed that when a pathogen's mycelia migrate to the xylem vessels of a plant's root system, they can partially or completely block the vessels, which is the primary cause of coffee wilt.
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