Strategic Resource Development and Deployment to Limit the Spread of Wheat Blast

The Farman lab will use their deep understanding of P. oryzae population structure, along with bioinformatic interrogation of genome sequence data for > 200 P. oryzae strains, to identify a set of diagnostic marker loci allowing wheat blast strains to be distinguished from all other host-specialized populations/species of Pyricularia. While the primary goal is to provide positive identification of wheat blast, the markers will be designed with the extended capability of resolving all currently known host-specialized populations/species, thereby providing responsiveness to future emergent diseases. In parallel, they will develop open source, automated software tools for population structure-guided and genome-assisted marker selection, with the goal of extending the project’s value to emergent diseases cause by other pathogens. Once sets of candidate marker loci have been identified, the Farman lab will then test their suitability for PCR based screens – as determined by their amplifiability/reproducibility/ specificity and sensitivity; and, possibly, their amenability to multiplexing.