Diagnosis and Management of Plant Fungal Diseases
A special issue of Plants (ISSN 2223-7747). This special issue belongs to the section "Plant Protection and Biotic Interactions".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 September 2026 | Viewed by 138
Special Issue Editors
Interests: fungi; pseudofungi; diagnostics; identification; characterization; pathogenicity/virulence testing; plant quarantine; Rhizoctonia; Alternaria; Phytophthora; Sclerotinia; Fusarium
Interests: plant disease diagnosis; fungi; pseudofungi; pathogen characterization; disease control; fungicide effectiveness; fungicide resistance; biological control; biofungicides; antagonistic microorganisms; essential oils; Botrytis; Monilinia; Colletotrichum; Verticillium
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Fungal plant diseases are a continuous and serious threat to plants worldwide, challenging researchers and producers to develop innovative approaches for successful production. Timely and reliable disease diagnosis, as a prerequisite for effective management, is currently the most attractive and rapidly developing area in plant pathology. It offers researchers the opportunity to apply imagination and creativity based on their knowledge and use powerful and dynamic molecular and conventional tools, with the aim of elucidating the unclear or unknown etiology of plant diseases. On the other hand, the management of fungal diseases must be based on effective yet sustainable approaches, taking into account increasingly strict administrative limitations and dynamic population changes in fungal communities, especially regarding pesticide resistance development. New insights into the multiple mechanisms used by antagonistic microorganisms to mediate pathogen suppression—such as competition for nutrients, production of antimicrobial compounds, induction of systemic resistance in the host plant, and direct parasitism of the pathogen—could greatly improve the effectiveness of disease management. Furthermore, various factors affecting the efficacy of antagonists, including not only their intrinsic antagonistic potential but also their ability to establish, persist, and remain functionally active under field conditions, deserve our attention and research efforts. Exploring the use of beneficial microorganisms in disease management is a longstanding but ongoing endeavor, always in need of new contributions.
Prof. Dr. Aleksandra R. Bulajić
Dr. Brankica Pešić
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Plants is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- innovative detection and identification methods
- new diseases
- new pathogens
- innovative control methods
- biological control
- beneficial microorganisms
- biopesticides
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