The fungus Sclerotinia has always been a fancy and interesting subject
of research both for the mycologists and pathologists. More than 250
species of the fungus have been reported in different host plants all
over the world that cause heavy economic losses. It was a challenge to
discover weak links in the disease cycle to manage Sclerotinia diseases
of large number of crops. For researchers and s- dents, it has been a
matter of concern, how to access voluminous literature on Sclerotinia
scattered in different journals, reviews, proceedings of symposia,
workshops, books, abstracts etc. to get a comprehensive picture. With
the pub- cation of book on 'Sclerotinia', it has now become quite clear
that now only three species of Sclerotinia viz., S. sclerotiorum, S.
minor and S. trifoliorum are valid. The authors have made an excellent
attempt to compile all the available infor- tion on various aspects of
the fungus Sclerotinia. The information generated so far has been
presented in different chapters. After introducing the subject various
aspects viz., the diseases, symptomatology, disease assessment, its
distribution, economic importance, the pathogen, its taxonomy,
nomenclature, reproduction, reproductive structures with fine details,
variability, perpetuation, infection and pathogenesis, biochemical,
molecular and physiological aspects of host-pathogen interaction, seed
infection, disease cycle, epidemiology and forecasting, host resistance
with sources of resistance, mechanism of resistance and other mana- ment
strategies have been covered.
