Population Genomics of Fungal Plant Pathogens and the Analyses of Rapidly Evolving Genome Compartments.

Genome sequencing of fungal pathogens have documented extensive variation in genome structure and composition between species and in many cases between individuals of the same species. This type of genomic variation can be adaptive for pathogens to rapidly evolve new virulence phenotypes. Analyses of genome-wide variation in fungal pathogen genomes rely on high quality assemblies and methods to detect and quantify structural variation.

Highly flexible infection programs in a specialized wheat pathogen.

Many filamentous plant pathogens exhibit high levels of genomic variability, yet the impact of this variation on host-pathogen interactions is largely unknown. We have addressed host specialization in the wheat pathogen . Our study builds on comparative analyses of infection and gene expression phenotypes of three isolates and reveals the extent to which genomic variation translates into phenotypic variation.