Epidemiology, Virulence Diversity and Host-Plant Resistance in Blast [Magnaporthe grisea (Hebert) Barr.] of Finger Millet [Eleusine coracana (L.) Gaertn.]

Studies were conducted on blast disease of finger millet that included cultural, morphological, pathological and molecular diversity, epidemiology and identification of host-plant resistance at International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), Patancheru, India and field trials were conducted at ICRISAT; ARS, Vizianagaram; RARS, Nandyal; ZARS, Mandya and OFRS, Naganahalli. A total of 125 blast disease specimens from finger millet, 6 from foxtail millet, 3 from rice and 5 from pearl millet were collected from major crop growing areas of India during 2008-2010. From these samples, a total of 70 monoconidial isolates of Magnaporthe grisea, 56 from finger millet, 6 from foxtail millet, 3 from rice and 5 from pearl millet were obtained. Of the 70 isolates, 15 each were from Patancheru and Vizianagaram, 13 from Nandyal, 14 from Mandya, 8 from Naganahalli and one each from Dholi, Aurangabad, Hissar, Jaipur and Solan...