Project Leaders:   
Richard Hamelin and Guus Bakkeren

Lead Institutions:   
University of British Columbia and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada
 
Research Funding Program:  
SOF 3

Novel genetic technologies are providing new strategies to combat threats from plant diseases

"Rust," a name commonly used to describe the fungi that attack and damage plants and trees, comes from the fact that some of these fungi have a reddish hue. Rust infections in food crops or trees have significant consequences. For example, cereals, which are primary hosts for rusts, are a key Canadian crop, with an annual production of 38 million tons, almost 40% of which is exported.  Poplar trees grow on 161.5 million hectares, with an annual harvest of 30 million cubic metres.  Harvested trees are sold for pulp and paper, composite veneer, and oriented strand board, and increasingly for carbon fixation and bioenergy.  Not only can rust lead to billions of dollars in lost revenues in the agricultural and forest sectors, it can also reduce food production and threaten ecosystems. Rust can spread from one country to another and can also adapt and change to new environments, presenting fresh threats to our economy, and also our food and ecological systems.

Researchers have long studied rust life cycles in order to find ways to prevent or fight  the disease. Taking an innovative approach, Dr. Richard Hamelin at the UBC Dept. of Forest Sciences and Dr. Guus Bakkeren from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, are working together to learn more about the molecular and genetic interactions between rusts and their hosts. Their goal is to identify genes that influence how rust infects plants, which plant genes help fight rust, and how the rust adapts quickly to new rust-resistant varieties of wheat that breeders produce.

To identify these genes, Drs. Hamelin and Bakkeren will infect different strains of wheat and poplar with different strains of rust in a laboratory setting.  They will then use new sequencing technologies to identify and compare the genes activated during the infection process. High powered computational  tools, or "bioinformatics," will be used to analyse and compare the enormous amount of data produced.

By identifying the key genes involved in rust infection, researchers will gain strategies to more quickly detect and monitor rust, and to more effectively prevent infection. The scientists involved in this study are part of several international consortia ensuring that discoveries are not being made in isolation. The results of this study will be used to protect Canada's precious agricultural and forestry resources, and those of other countries as well.