THE PHYTOPATHOLOGICAL SIGNIFICANCE OF MYCELIAL INDIVIDUALISM

Focuses on the problems facing an individual, plant-infecting fungal mycelial agent in terms of the maintenance of evolutionary fitness, both of itself and of its progeny. The extent to which competition with other genets of the same or different species is a major determinant of its life style, and depends largely on the degree to which it is adapted to stress tolerant-, ruderal- or competitive selection in stable ecosystems, or to episodic selection in unstable ones. Developmental versatility is an important component of fitness where changes in microenvironmental conditions attend colonization and exploitation of host and non-living resources. -from Author