Characterization of the Cassava Mycobiome in Symptomatic Leaf Tissues Displaying Cassava Superelongation Disease

Superelongation disease (SED) is a fungal disease that affects cassava in the Caribbean. The symptoms include the appearance of dry necrotic spots and lesions on the leaves, which may severely affect the plant yield. However, the primary causal pathogen is difficult to culture and isolate in the lab because of its slow growth and potential contamination from faster-growing organisms. In addition, the leaf symptoms can be confused with those caused by other pathogens that produce similar necrotic spots and scab-like lesions. There is also little or no information on the contribution of endophytes, if any, to disease symptoms in cassava, a plant where the disease is prevalent. Therefore, this study aimed to characterize the fungal communities in cassava associated with SED symptoms by analyzing gross fungal morphology and performing metagenomics profiling. First, several individual pathogenic fungi were isolated and cultured from diseased cassava leaf tissues from seven locations in Barbados (BB). Both culture isolation and molecular community analyses showed the presence of several other fungi in the disease microenvironment of symptomatic cassava leaves. These included <i>Fusarium</i>, <i>Colletotrichum</i>, and <i>Alternaria</i> species and the suspected species <i>Elsinoë brasiliensis</i> synonym <i>Sphaceloma manihoticola</i>. Additionally, a community analysis using ITS2 amplicon sequencing of 21 symptomatic leaf tissues from BB, St. Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG), Trinidad and Tobago (TT), and Jamaica (JA) revealed that the disease symptoms of superelongation may also result from the interactions of fungal communities in the mycobiome, including <i>Elsinoë species</i> and other fungi such as <i>Colletotrichum</i>, <i>Cercospora</i>, <i>Alternaria</i>, and <i>Fusarium</i>. Therefore, we suggest that examining the pathobiome concept in SED in the future is necessary.