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The relationship between yield loss and disease severity can differ widely between crops. This has given rise to the concept of disease tolerance, with some crops exhibiting a smaller yield loss under a given severity of disease than others. Genetic improvement to minimise yield loss under disease is an attractive goal, as it exerts little or no selection pressure on pathogen populations, and could form a useful component of durable disease management programmes. However, progress towards this end requires a thorough understanding of the phenotypic traits that influence the response of yield to disease, their genetic control and the possible trade-offs involved with other desirable agronomic characteristics. This paper examines the candidate crop traits that may confer tolerance of foliar disease in wheat and barley and reviews evidence of genetic variation in their expression. In wheat grown under the relatively low light conditions of North-West Europe, post-anthesis source (assimilate supply) and grain sink capacity (capacity for dry matter accumulation) appear to be closely balanced. Traits associated with maintaining post-anthesis radiation interception and radiation use efficiency in spite of disease may confer tolerance. The most promising traits include a larger flag leaf and compensatory increases in photosynthetic rate in non-infected parts of leaves. In barley, yield is often more strongly sink limited, and early-season disease management is required to protect the formation of potential grain sites. A wider range of potential traits may influence tolerance including compensatory adjustments in leaf growth and morphology, and differences in the sensitivity of tiller and spikelet mortality to photoassimilate supply. Different methods for quantifying tolerance are suggested depending on the trait of interest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A great deal of information is available in the literature on the effects of nutrition on disease development in plants and crops. However, much of this information is contradictory and although it is widely recognised that nutrition can influence disease in crops, limited progress has been made in the manipulation of crop nutrition to enhance disease control. Achieving this aim requires a sound understanding of the effects of fertilisation on nutrient levels and availability in crop tissues, and in turn, how the nutrient status of such tissues influences pathogen infection, colonisation and sporulation. Some of these details are known for a number of crop plants under controlled conditions, but very little of this type of information is available for crops under field conditions. This review focuses on nitrogen, sulphur, phosphorus, potassium and silicon, examines the availability of these nutrients in plant tissues to support pathogen growth and development, and reviews the effects of the different nutrients on disease development. The review also examines the potential for manipulating crop nutrition to enhance disease control in conventional and organic cropping systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ethokem (Midkem Agrochemicals, Northampton, UK) and Bond (Newman Agrochemicals, Cambridge, UK) completely inhibited linear growth of Pyricularia oryzae at 1 and 2% concentrations of the compounds and strongly inhibited growth of Pyrenophora avenae in vitro. Vapor Gard (Miller Chemical & Fertilizer Corporation, Hannover, PA, USA) was less effective with relatively little inhibition of P. oryzae, but was a more effective inhibitor of P. avenae. All three compounds decreased cell lengths of both pathogens and increased cell diameters of P. avenae. Vapor Gard and Ethokem did not significantly alter cell diameters of P. oryzae, but a highly significant increase was observed with Bond. Gross changes in hyphal morphology were observed including swollen shortened cells, granulation of the cytoplasm, increased branching and collapsed empty cells. Ethokem and Bond decreased growth rate and inhibited biomass production of P. avenae. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effects were examined of barley powdery mildew (Erysiphe graminis f. sp. bordei) the major leaf protein, ribulose-1,5-bisphosphate carboxylase (RuBPCase), and other enzymes of CO2 assimilation, phosphoenolpyruvate carboxylase (PEPcase), and malic enzymes, and enzymes associated with RuBPCase in the reductive pentose phosphate pathway. Activity of RuBPCase per unit fresh weight of leaf was inhibited by infection from the first sample, 3 days after inoculation, to the last sample, 24 days after inoculation, when healthy control leaves were visibly senescing. The inhibition occurred because the amount of RuBPCase protein (measured specifically by an immunological technique) was reduced from 6 days after inoculation, at which time there was little protein remaining. Activity of PEPcase per unit fresh weight of leaf was initially stimulated by infection, but, thereafter, it was inhibited. Inhibition, like that also affecting malic enzymes (NAD) and (NADP), 3-phosphglycerate kinase, and glyceraldehydes-3-phosphate dehyrogenases (NAD) and (NADP), was associated with a decline in amounts of total soluble minus RuBPCase protein per unit fresh weight of leaf. Reduced amounts of leaf protein may be associated with reduced nitrate uptake by roots and fungal demand for nitrogen in mildewed plants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

First leaves of barley seedlings grown in solution culture were inoculated with powdery mildew when the second leaf was fully emerged. 14C-labelled carbon dioxide was fed to either first or second leaves of infected and non-infected plants. Translocation of labelled photoassimilates into roots, and partitioning into soluble, storage and structural fractions were studied in tip, mid and basal regions of primary roots 24 h after feeding. Mildew reduced the total activity in the plant, but had little effect on assimilate distribution since the percentage activity translocated to roots was only transiently reduced, approximately 7 days after infection. Reduced import led to a reduction in the specific activity of different fractions within roots, reductions being greatest in root tips. These changes were similar whichever leaf was fed. Changes in specific activity became progressively more pronounced in the 10 days following infection, and were paralleled by a reduction in the mitotic index of root tips. It is concluded that meristematic activity, and thus the growth, of primary roots of barley is particularly sensitive to reductions in photoassimilation caused by powdery mildew infection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]