Morphological and Molecular Analysis of Fungal Species Associated with Blast and Brown Spot Diseases of .

Fungal diseases blast and brown spot in rice cause severe yield losses worldwide. Blast is caused by , and is reported as the main causal organism of brown spot. Both diseases cause leaf lesions that are difficult differentiate until the later stages.

In silico molecular and morphological analysis of rice blast resistant gene Pi-ta in Sri Lankan rice germplasm.

Background: Pi-ta is a major blast resistant gene, introgressed from indica rice varieties. In this study, diversity of the Pi-ta gene of 47 Sri Lankan rice accessions was studied by bioinformatics, and the results were validated with molecular and disease reaction assays. Sequences of rice accessions at the locus Os12g0281300 were retrieved from Rice SNP-Seek Database, and the coding sequence of reference Pi-ta gene of cultivar Tetep (accession no.