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During disease disease surveys carried out in the years 2006, 2007 and 2008, severe natural rust infections on biomass poplar cultivations in clone experimental field trials in the province of Perugia (Umbria, Central Italy) were observed both in summer and autumn. The foliage of infected plants presented the typical rusty coloration for the presence of uredinia, mainly on the abaxial leaf surface, and teliospores which appeared at the end of the growing season. All tested clones showed to be susceptible to the disease, with significant incidence and severity differences among them. Clones 'Sirio', 'Baldo' and 'AF8' showed a lower susceptibility with respect to the other clones. Weather data suggested that the early summer attacks observed in 2008 were favored by the high rainfalls recorded in June and by the possible presence of asexual spores which were able to overwinter on infected leaf residues. Microscopic observations of the morphological characteristics of pathogen spores, the examination of infected leaf sections, species-specific PCR assays, and pathotype identification revealed that the recorded rust attacks were caused by the species Melampsora larici-populina (pathotype 2-4) and Melampsora allii-populina. This represents a comprehensive study on the occurrence of poplar leaf rust in central Italy, an area where poplar short rotation coppice (SRC) could potentially increase in the next years. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Dothistroma needle blight (DNB) emerged in France in the past 15 years. This disease is induced by two closely related species: Dothistroma septosporum and D. pini. Although both species are currently present in France, only D. septosporum was reported in the past. We investigated whether a recent arrival of D. pini in France could be a cause of the DNB emergence. We analyzed herbarium specimens of pine needles with DNB symptoms using polymerase chain reaction techniques to study the past frequency of D. pini in France. We also determined the present distribution within the country of D. septosporum and D. pini and compared it with the spatial pattern of DNB reported in the Département de la Santé des Forêts (DSF; French forest health monitoring agency) database. Although D. pini was detected on herbarium specimens from 1907 and 1965, it was not frequent in France in the past. Today, it is frequent, although not present throughout the country, being absent from the north and the east. There is no relationship between the D. pini distribution in France and the spatial pattern of DNB reported in the DSF database. Thus, the emergence of DNB in France cannot be explained by a recent arrival of D. pini.

Between 1987 and 2010, more than one hundred poplar cultivars were tested in order to assess their behaviour towards larch rust (Melampsora larici-populina). For most of them, we determined in the laboratory the virulences required to infect them. Then all clones were submitted to infection in three nurseries with a selected inoculum that reflected the diversity of the pathogen races. Susceptibility levels are provided for two periods and the virulences required for infection are given. Almost all the clones selected for complete resistance have lost this characteristic and the resulting infection level is often heavy, especially on inter-American clones.

Ioos, R., Fabre, B., Saurat, C., Fourrier, C., Frey, P., and Marcais, B. 2010. Development, comparison, and validation of real-time and conventional PCR tools for the detection of the fungal pathogens causing brown spot and red band needle blights of pine. Phytopathology 100:105-114. Dothistroma pini, D. septosporum, and Lecanosticta acicola are fungal pathogens that cause severe foliage diseases in conifers. All three pathogens are listed as quarantine organisms in numerous countries throughout the world and, thus, are subject to specific monitoring. Detection and identification of these pathogens still often relies on cumbersome and unsatisfactory methods that are based upon the morphological characterization of fungal fruiting bodies and conidia. In this study, we present the development of several new molecular tools that enable a rapid and specific in planta detection of each of these pathogens. Several DNA extraction procedures starting from infected needles were compared and four commercial DNA extraction kits provided DNA of satisfactory quality for amplification by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). In addition, we developed several sets of conventional PCR primers, dual-labeled probes (DLPs), and duplex-scorpion probes (DSPs), all of which targeted each pathogen. Their ability to detect the pathogens in a series of naturally infected needle samples was compared. The quadruplex DLP real-time assay proved to be more sensitive than the DSP assay and conventional PCR but the two real-time probe formats yielded identical results in the naturally infected samples. Both real-time assays proved to be significantly superior to the technique of humid chamber incubation, which often failed to produce spores for the accurate identification of the pathogens.

Background Corticosteroid-induced lipodystrophy (CIL) is exclusively diagnosed in a subjective manner. Objective To evaluate the reliability of digital photographs in the diagnosis of CIL. Methods All consecutive patients starting long-term, high dosage corticosteroid therapy were photographed at baseline and after 3 months of therapy. At the end of the study, 3 physicians with expertise in corticosteroids classified patients as lipodystrophic yes/no/unclassifiable. Photographs analyses performed by 9 medical readers and evaluation of CIL using visual analog scale (VAS) performed during the M3 visit were compared to this classification. Results Eighty-eight patients were monitored. Fifty of them were classified by the 3 experts as lipodystrophic and 30 as not lipodystrophic (8 were unclassifiable). Their intra- and inter-observer agreements were moderate or fair (κ coefficient ≤ 0.57) when month 3 photographs were analysed alone and substantial or near perfect (κ coefficient ≥ 0.75) when M3 photographs were analysed beside baseline ones. By comparison with expert consensus, only 3 out of 4 patients were correctly classified using VAS. The AUROC curve and inter-observer agreement significantly improved with experience for the 9 non-experts. Conclusion The use of digital photographs do better than VAS to evaluate CIL. The accuracy of diagnosis improves with experience. Morphological changes are more important than morphological phenotype.

In 2001 a metaanalysis reported an excess risk of systemic sclerosis (SSc) related to solvents exposure. The magnitude of risk varied among studies and sources of heterogeneity have not been investigated due to a lack of statistical power. We conducted a new metaanalysis to identify features associated with the magnitude of SSc risk in patients exposed to solvents.We searched 4 databases (Medline, Pascal, Pascal Biomed, Francis). Inclusion criteria were: case-control study, occupational exposure to solvents (OES) assessed by questionnaire and summarized to "any solvent" or "any organic solvent," SSc defined by the American College of Rheumatology or the consultant's criteria. The quality of studies within this metaanalysis was scored according to the Newcastle-Ottawa scale. Odds ratios (OR) were adjusted for the "publication bias" and validated by a sensitivity analysis. Subgroup analyses investigated the effect of gender, quality of studies, and the type of controls.Among 11 studies (1291 patients and 3435 controls), 9 involved a majority of women (76.2 to 100%), while 2 involved men only. The risk of SSc associated with OES was variable among studies (p for heterogeneity = 0.01) and overrepresentation of higher OR values in smaller studies (p = 0.003) suggested "publication bias." SSc was associated with OES (OR 2.4; 95% CI 1.7-3.4; p0.0001), including after adjusting for bias (OR 1.8; 95% CI 1.2-2.5; p = 0.002). The relative risk was higher (p = 0.03) in men (OR 3.0; 95% CI 1.9-4.6; p0.0001) than in women (OR 1.8; 95% CI 1.5-2.1; p0.0001).Whereas SSc affects women predominantly, among subjects with occupational exposure to solvents, men are at higher risk than women for the disease.

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