Neocosmospora keratoplastica, a relevant human fusarial pathogen is found to be associated with wilt and root rot of Muskmelon and Watermelon crops in Spain: epidemiological and molecular evidences

Abstract

Some taxa of the Fusarium solani species complex (FSSC) have been associated with clinical infections in humans and plant diseases. Among the several fusaria that cause relevant mycoses in cucurbits in Spain, Neocosmospora keratoplastica is described for the first time as responsible for wilt and root rot in both watermelon and melon crops in producing areas of Valencia and Alicante provinces. Due to the ecological and systematic complexity of the group, with described clinical forms and plant pathogens practically indistin- guishable from each other, both pathological evidences (including artificial inoculation bioassays) and molecu- lar methods (multilocus phylogeny based on ITS, TEF- 1α, and RPB2 regions) are provided to confirm this finding, since the presence of this soil-borne pathogen could have been probably underestimated in cucurbits producing areas of Spain.