The Gene Flow Direction of Geographically Distinct Phytophthora infestans Populations in China Corresponds With the Route of Seed Potato Exchange

Fangluan Gao; Changsheng Chen; Benjin Li; Qiyong Weng; Qinghe Chen

doi:10.3389/fmicb.2020.01077

The Gene Flow Direction of Geographically Distinct Phytophthora infestans Populations in China Corresponds With the Route of Seed Potato Exchange

Front Microbiol. 2020 May 26:11:1077. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2020.01077. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Fangluan Gao¹, Changsheng Chen², Benjin Li², Qiyong Weng^{1

2}, Qinghe Chen^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Ecological Pest Control for Fujian and Taiwan Crops, Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University, Fuzhou, China.
² Fujian Key Laboratory for Monitoring and Integrated Management of Crop Pests, Institute of Plant Protection, Fujian Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Fuzhou, China.

Abstract

Phytophthora infestans is a widespread destructive plant pathogen that causes economic losses worldwide to potato production. In this study, we sequenced four mitochondrial DNA gene sequences of 101 P. infestans isolates from five potato-growing regions in China to investigate the population structure and dispersal pattern of this pathogen. The concatenated mtDNA sequences in the populations showed high haplotype diversity, but low nucleotide diversity. Although there was a degree of spatial structure, our phylogeographic analyses support frequent gene flow between populations and the direction of gene flow, primarily from north to south, corresponds to the route of seed potato transportation, suggesting a role of human activities in the dispersal of P. infestans in China.

Keywords: Phytophthora infestans; genetic diversity; migration pattern; mitochondrial DNA; population structure.