An experimental enzyme significantly reduced fire blight in apple orchard field trials, offering growers a promising new way to fight one of the fruit industry's most destructive diseases.
The findings, published in Environmental Science & Technology, mark the first major research milestone in a $5.7 million U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Specialty Crop Research Initiative project led by Virginia Tech. Researchers from eight institutions across seven apple-producing states are combining expertise in engineering, plant pathology, robotics, and other fields to develop a new generation of fire blight management tools.
"Our primary goal has always been to build a toolbox for growers rather than rely on a single solution," said Srdjan Acimovic, principal investigator of the project and associate professor of tree fruit pathology in the School of Plant and Environmental Sciences. "This study shows one of those tools has real potential under orchard conditions."
Fire blight, caused by the bacterium Erwinia amylovora, costs U.S. apple and pear growers an estimated $100 million annually. The disease has become increasingly difficult to manage as the bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics. At the same time, warmer, wetter spring weather has created more favorable conditions for infection, while modern high-density orchards allow the disease to spread more rapidly from tree to tree and kill entire trees.
Source : vt.edu