Identification of Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. ciceris Physiological Races in Chickpea Cultivated Areas in Al-Ghab Region, Syria

Alloush, L., S. Al-Maghribi and B. Barhom. 2021. Identification of Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. ciceris Physiological Races in Chickpea Cultivated Areas in Al-Ghab Region, Syria. Arab Journal of Plant Protection, 39(4): 231-240. https://doi.org/10.22268/AJPP-39.4.231240 Fusarium wilt disease caused by Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. ciceris is one of the diseases that cause significant economic losses to the chickpea crop around the world, as infection with FOC can occurs during the different stages of plant growth. One of the best approaches to reduce the damage caused by FOC is by using resistant chickpea varieties. Hence, this study aimed to determine the physiological races of 25 FOC isolates collected from 20 agricultural sites belonging to six regulatory zones in the Al-Ghab region in Syria, based on their pathogenicity on 13 differential chickpea cultivars (C-104, JG -74, CPS-1, BG-215, BG-212, WR-315, Anniger, Chaffa, ILC482, L-550, K850-3/27, UC-27). The study was carried out during 2020 at the Agricultural Scientific Research Center in Al-Ghab. The results obtained showed that the tested isolates belong to races 0, 1B/C, 2, 3, 5, and 6. This is the first report of races 2 and 3 in Syria, and each of them constituted 28% of the total tested isolates, whereas 24% of the isolates were represented by race 0, and both races 5 and 1B/C occurred at 8% frequency, and race 6 included one isolate obtained from Abu Faraj site. Keywords: Chickpea, vascular wilt, physiological races, pathogenicity, Al-Ghab, Syria