A new species of planthopper in the genus Paraphenice (Hemiptera: Derbidae: Otiocerinae) from palms in eastern Madagascar.

A survey of planthoppers associated with palms in Madagascar was initiated to assess putative vectors of a phytoplasma causing palm decline. Here a derbid collected from a Chinese fan palm (Livistona chinensis) is described as Paraphenice fluctus sp. n.

First report of ' Phytoplasma palmae' (16SrIV-A subgroup) associated with palm Lethal Yellowing disease on and in Guadeloupe, French West Indies.

Lethal Yellowing (LY) disease causes major damage to palms in Central America and the Caribbean. It has been reported as far south as Antigua (Myrie et al., 2014).

First report of strains related to the phytoplasma associated with Tanzanian Lethal Decline on on the western coast of Madagascar.

Madagascar is a high diversity hotspot in the world, and palms are highly represented with nearly 200 endemic species (Rakotoarinivo et al., 2014). Coconut tree (Cocos nucifera) could have been introduced in Madagascar by Austronesians around AD 400 or 700 (Beaujard, 2011).

Multilocus Sequence Analysis Reveals Three Distinct Populations of " Phytoplasma palmicola" with a Specific Geographical Distribution on the African Continent.

To sustain epidemiological studies on coconut lethal yellowing disease (CLYD), a devastating disease in Africa caused by a phytoplasma, we developed a multilocus sequence typing (MLST) scheme for " Phytoplasma palmicola" based on eight housekeeping genes. At the continental level, eight different sequence types were identified among 132 " Phytoplasma palmicola"-infected coconuts collected in Ghana, Nigeria, and Mozambique, where CLYD epidemics are still very active. " Phytoplasma palmicola" appeared to be a bacterium that is subject to strong bottlenecks, reducing the fixation of positively selected beneficial mutations into the bacterial population.

Adaptation of Phytophthora infestans to Partial Resistance in Potato: Evidence from French and Moroccan Populations.

ABSTRACT The use of partially resistant cultivars should become an essential component of a sustainable management strategy of potato late blight, caused by Phytophthora infestans. It is therefore important to determine to what extent P. infestans populations can be selected for increased aggressiveness by potato cultivars with different levels of partial resistance.