Project Number: 6222-22430-002-00
Project Type: Appropriated

Start Date: Jul 20, 2003
End Date: Apr 30, 2008

Objective:
Overall objective is to develop customer-based pre- and postharvest disease control technologies for economic production and postharvest maintenance of cucurbit crops. Due to consumer concerns of the adverse effects of pesticides on environmental quality and food safety, research will focus on alternative, safe, and efficient disease management programs having regional and national applicability that ensure sustainable and productive farm production systems that preserve soil and water quality.

Approach:
To develop technologies necessary to devise integrated systems to control pre- and postharvest diseases of cucurbits, progress in establishing parameters of pathogen virulence, plant response to soilborne pathogens, effects of cultural management on disease, and elucidation of the mechanisms of fruit rot resistance, the following objectives will be pursued: 1) to establish pathogenic potential of soilborne pathogen population and develop integrated approaches for effective control in cucurbit crops, 2) identify and characterize the bacterium (Serratia marcescens) causing cucurbit yellow vine disease (CYVD), 3) determine the role of fungal cell wall degrading enzymes in selected cantaloupe fruit rot diseases, and 4) elucidate the role of polygalactruonase inhibiting protein (PGIP) as a possible defense mechanism by cucurbit fruit against non-latent and latent pathogens. Because soilborne diseases are inherently difficult to study, more precise methods of quantifying plant damage as well as pathogen virulence are prerequisite in formulating and measuring effective disease control strategies. A wide array of conventional and novel approaches will be employed to elucidate the biological and exogenous factors that illicit aggressiveness and host response effects.