Project Info

The Fusarium Comparative Project

The genus Fusarium collectively represents the most important group of fungal plant pathogens, causing various diseases on nearly every economically important plant species. Of equal concern is the health hazard posed to humans and livestock by the plethora of Fusarium mycotoxins. Besides their economic importance, species of Fusarium also serve as key model organisms for biological and evolutionary research.

In 2002, the F. graminearum sequencing project was funded by the National Research Initiative, which is within the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Cooperative State Research Education and Extension Service through the USDA/National Science Foundation Microbial Genome Sequencing Project. The F. graminearum sequencing project represents a partnership between the Broad and the International Gibberella zeae Genomics Consortium (IGGR).

Continuing this effort, a Fusarium comparative project was funded through the same agency to improve gene annotation and to identify functional non-coding elements of F. graminearum. Two additional Fusarium species, F. oxysporum and F. verticillioides have been selected at the same time to study evolutionary biology among these closely related but biologically distinct Fusarium species. These genomes are appropriately diverged from F. graminearum, while being important research platforms in their own right. F. oxysporum is a broad host range pathogen that has caused some of the world's most dramatic and economically devastating plant disease epidemics. Recently F. oxysporum has also emerged as a model for soil-borne fungal diseases with Arabidopsis and tomato as hosts. F. verticillioides is a cosmopolitan pathogen of maize and sorghum, and produces carcinogenic mycotoxins known as fumonisins.

A three-way comparison of F. oxysporum, F. verticillioides and F. graminearum offers powerful synergy in studies of pathogenicity and virulence factors, and their evolution within this genus.

Fusarium comparative manuscript supplementary files

Please visit the Fusarium comparative manuscript supplementary files page for data files.

The main collaborators of Fusarium comparative project

  • Dr. Corby Kistler at USDA, ARS Cereal Disease Lab of University of Minnesota
  • Dr. Jin-Rong Xu ant Purdue University
  • Dr. Frances Trail at Michigan State University
  • Dr. Seogchan Kang at Penn State University
  • Dr. Won-Bo Shim at Texas A&M University
  • Dr. Charles Woloshuk at Purdue University

Data Releases

March, 2007 - Release of the Fusaria Group site containg assembly and annotation of Fusarium verticillioides, Fusarium graminearum, and Fusarium oxysporum.

December, 2006 - Release of the automated annotation of Fusarium verticillioides

October, 2006 - Fusarium verticillioides Release 2. An 8X whole-genome shotgun assembly of F. verticillioides and the integration of the assembly to the existing genetic map. The assembly was deposited at Genbank under the project accession AIM01000000.

July, 2005 - Fusarium verticillioides Release 1. A 4X whole-genome shotgun assembly. The assembly was deposited at Genbank under the project accession AIM01000000.

Photo Credits

The photos on the front page come courtesy (left to right):

  1. Frances Trail, Department of Plant Biology at Michigan State University
  2. H. Corby Kistler, USDA, ARS Cereal Disease Lab and Department of Plant Pathology, University of Minnesota
  3. Jin-Rong Xu, Department of Botany and Plant Pathology, Purdue University
  4. Charles Woloshuk at Purdue University
  5. H. Corby Kistler, USDA, ARS Cereal Disease Lab and Department of Plant Pathology, University of Minnesota