Monitoring Spore Dispersal and Early Infections of Causing Apple Blotch Using Spore Traps and a New qPCR Method.

Apple blotch (AB) is a major disease of apple in Asia and recently emerged in Europe and the United States. It is caused by the fungus (formerly ; teleomorph: ) and leads to severe defoliation of apple trees in late summer, resulting in reduced yield and fruit quality. To develop effective disease management strategies, a sound knowledge of the pathogen's biology is crucial.

Reducing copper use in the environment: the use of larixol and larixyl acetate to treat downy mildew caused by Plasmopara viticola in viticulture.

Background: Plant extracts might provide sustainable alternatives to copper fungicides, which are still widely used despite their unfavourable ecotoxicological profile. Larch bark extract and its constituents, larixyl acetate and larixol, have been shown to be effective against grapevine downy mildew (Plasmopara viticola) under semi-controlled conditions. The aim of this study was to reduce the gap between innovation and the registration of a marketable product, namely to develop scalable extraction processes and to evaluate and optimise the performance of larch extracts under different conditions.