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- Recently,scientists at the National Institute of Plant Genome Research has unraveled the genomic diversity associated with aggressiveness of two Indian strains of Rhizoctonia solani.
- Rhizoctonia solani is a fungal pathogen that causes the dreaded Sheath Blight disease in rice.
- Sheath Blight disease is a major issue in rice cultivation.It can cause up to 60% reduction in rice yield.It is difficult to breed disease resistant rice varieties as there is a lack of natural source of disease resistance.Thus, controlling the disease in a sustainable manner has remained a challenge.
- The scientists have identified several genes and gene families in the strain that might account for their disease aggressiveness.This genomic insight is expected to help develop rice varieties resistant to sheath blight disease.
- The scientists have also said that the further characterisation of the identified genes will be helpful to understand their role in the pathogenesis of the fungus.



