Etiological and Molecular Characterization of Sclerotinia sclerotiorum Associated with Stem and Crown Rot in Alfalfa

Alfalfa (Medicago sativa), a member of the family Fabaceae, is one of the oldest and most important forage crops in the world, commonly referred to as the “Queen of Forages.” Despite its high nutritional value and agronomic significance, alfalfa is susceptible to a wide range of diseases caused by fungi, bacteria, and viruses. Among these, stem and crown rot, caused by Sclerotinia sclerotiorum, represents a serious threat to alfalfa production. This disease significantly contributes to yield losses, with a substantial portion of the crop potentially lost each year. Due to its wide host range, S. sclerotiorum has emerged as a global problem, impacting various economically important crops and resulting in considerable annual losses. Keeping in view high yield losses due to this disease, this research has been mainly deals withEtiological and Molecular Characterization of Sclerotinia sclerotiorum associated with Stem and Crown Rot in Alfalfa. There is also a need to study and understanding of the conditions for S. sclerotiorum inoculum production for managing and controlling the stem and crown rot disease caused by S. sclerotiorum. During survey maximum disease incidence was recorded. Morphological characterization of the pathogen was based on the size of sclerotia and morphology of the ascospore. S. sclerotiorum were characterized on the basis of morphological as well as molecular technique (using ITS primers-ITS1/ITS4). The sequences were submitted to Fungal Molecular Biology Laboratory Culture Collection University of Agriculture Faisalabad (FMB CC UAF) given accession number FMB 0123. Single parsimonious phylogenetic tree was constructed in which queried sequences present in separate clade indicated that all queried sequences are phylogenetically diverse from other sequences present in separate clade indicated that all queried sequence is phylogenetically diverse from other sequences present in comparison and has maximum similarity with S.sclerotiorum.