VIEW ARTICLE

Techniques

An Efficient Technique for Inducing Profuse Sporulation of Alternaria Species. E. A. Shahin, Research associate, Department of Plant Pathology, Kansas State University, Manhattan, 66506; J. F. Shepard, professor, Department of Plant Pathology, Kansas State University, Manhattan, 66506. Phytopathology 69:618-620. Accepted for publication 21 December 1978. Copyright 1979 The American Phytopathological Society. DOI: 10.1094/Phyto-69-618.

A new technique was developed for inducing profuse sporulation of Alternaria solani, A. alternata, and A. dauci in pure culture without the concomitant production of aerial mycelium. Agar blocks from cultures on primary media were transferred to the surface of a second (sporulation) medium of water agar plus CaCO₃ and incubated in the dark at 18 C. Spores were harvested after 18–24 hr. Initial addition of sucrose to the sporulation medium allowed repeated harvest of conidia at 24-hr intervals. Helminthosporium maydis race T also sporulated well then subjected to this protocol, but a fourth Alternaria species (A. zinniae) that was tested did not.