Mario Baumann, Diplomand
Within the ATMT project I am screening for transformants of Colletotrichum graminicola, which show a reduced virulence or a loss of pathogenicity phenotype. The identification of the disrupted gene or genomic region will be done subsequently.
In order to do so, I am performing virulence assays on detached maize leafs and on whole living maize plans to select candidates with the described phenotype out of hundreds of transformants generated by ATMT.
In the case of a comparable reduced virulence phenotype for one candidate in both virulence assays, the molecular work starts with the extraction of genomic DNA and the performance of southern blot analysis to investigate the integration frequency of the T-DNA into the genome of a virulence compromised transformant. For those with single T-DNA integrations, the exact position of the T-DNA will be identified to determine e.g. a virulence gene or a genomic region contributing to virulence.