Genome Sequence of the Chestnut Blight Fungus <i>Cryphonectria parasitica</i> EP155: A Fundamental Resource for an Archetypical Invasive Plant Pathogen
Jo Anne Crouch, Angus L. Dawe, Andrea Aerts, Kerrie Barry, Alice C. L. Churchill, Jane Grimwood, Bradley I. Hillman, Michael G. Milgroom, Jasmyn Pangilinan, Myron L. Smith, Asaf Salamov, Jeremy Schmutz, Jagjit S. Yadav, Igor V. Grigoriev, Donald L. Nuss
Abstract
Cryphonectria parasitica is the causal agent of chestnut blight, a fungal disease that almost entirely eliminated mature American chestnut from North America over a 50-year period. Here, we formally report the genome of C. parasitica EP155 using a Sanger shotgun sequencing approach. After finishing and integration with simple-sequence repeat markers, the assembly was 43.8 Mb in 26 scaffolds (L 50 = 5; N 50 = 4.0Mb). Eight chromosomes are predicted: five scaffolds have two telomeres and six scaffolds have one telomere sequence. In total, 11,609 gene models were predicted, of which 85% show similarities to other proteins. This genome resource has already increased the utility of a fundamental plant pathogen experimental system through new understanding of the fungal vegetative incompatibility system, with significant implications for enhancing mycovirus-based biological control.