Phytoplasmas: Plant Pathogenic Bacteria - III Genomics, host pathogen interactions, and diagnosis

Phytoplasma-associated diseases are severely limiting the quality and productivity of many ornamental, horticultural and other economically important crops worldwide. Their dangerous impact is economically relevant in sugarcane, sesame, grapevine, fruit trees and coconut palm severely reducing the economic revenues for farmers and stakeholders. There is no effective cure for these diseases therefore the basic knowledge about their biological and biochemical influence on plant and insect vectors are the basic instruments for designing management options aimed to minimize their spread by insect vectors, propagation materials, host plant resistance. The scientific literature concerning genomic, effectors and pathogenicity factors is allowing the understanding of the phytoplasma-host metabolic interaction. It provides comprehensive information on biological, serological and molecular characterization of the phytoplasmas including the recent approaches for diagnostics. Transcriptomics studies paved the way for analyzing the gene expression pattern in phytoplasmas upon infection and revealed the up-regulation of genes associated to hormonal response, transcription factors, and signaling genes. Although phytoplasmas remain the most poorly characterized pathogens, recent studies have identified virulence factors that induce typical disease symptoms and have characterized the unique reductive evolution of the genome. The presentation of the progresses in cultivation in axenic media together with the perspectives for future research that will allow reducing the incidence and the losses due to these pathogens in the agriculture worldwide are also presented. Hence, the major recent research findings are compiled in this book We greatly acknowledge all the contributed authors for their efforts in synthesizing the most updated reviews on the subjects. We also like to thank the support and input of the publisher, Springer-Nature (Pvt_ Ltd), Singapore, for its effort to publish this book. We strongly hope that it will be useful to everyone interested in phytoplasma research, plant pathology, microbiology, plant biology and agriculture, and serve as an exhaustive and up-to-date reference on various aspects of phytoplasma-associated diseases in order to help the further progress of this branch of the plant pathology scientific knowledge.