Potential of Nonthermal Atmospheric-Pressure Dielectric Barrier Discharge Plasma for Inhibition of Athelia rolfsii Causing Southern Blight Disease in Lettuce

Salit Supakitthanakorn, On-Uma Ruangwong (), Choncharoen Sawangrat, Wimada Srisuwan and Dheerawan Boonyawan ()
Additional contact information
Salit Supakitthanakorn: Department of Plant Pathology, Faculty of Agriculture at Kamphaeng Sean Campus, Kasetsart University, Nakhon Pathom 73140, Thailand
On-Uma Ruangwong: Division of Plant Pathology, Department of Entomology and Plant Pathology, Faculty of Agriculture, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai 50200, Thailand
Choncharoen Sawangrat: Department of Industrial Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai 50200, Thailand
Wimada Srisuwan: Agriculture and Bio Plasma Technology Center (ABPlas), Science and Technology Park, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai 50100, Thailand
Dheerawan Boonyawan: Plasma and Beam Physics Research Facility, Faculty of Science, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai 50200, Thailand

Agriculture, 2023, vol. 13, issue 1, 1-14

Abstract: Athelia rolfsii is one of the most destructive and aggressive fungal pathogens worldwide and causes southern blight disease of lettuce. A nonthermal atmospheric-pressure dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) plasma has attracted interest as an alternative control method to chemical usage because of its antimicrobial activity. Exposure of A. rolfsii to DBD plasma for 5, 10, 15, and 20 min resulted in in vitro fungal inhibition of mycelial discs and sclerotia. The results showed that DBD plasma exposure for 10 min completely inhibited fungal growth of mycelial discs, whereas exposure for over 20 min was required to inhibit the hyphal growth of sclerotia. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) observations of mycelia and sclerotia abnormalities revealed laceration and damage of both mycelia and sclerotia. In addition, disease incidence and severity were reduced in mycelial and sclerotia inoculation following DBD plasma exposure for 15 and 20 min, respectively, compared with the positive control. In conclusion, the DBD plasma demonstrates antifungal activity against A. rolfsii via inhibition of fungal growth and reduction in disease incidence and severity. Therefore, DBD plasma has the potential to be applied in controlling southern blight disease of lettuce.

Keywords: DBD plasma; antifungal activity; fungal inhibition; sclerotia; lettuce (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q1 Q10 Q11 Q12 Q13 Q14 Q15 Q16 Q17 Q18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/13/1/167/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/13/1/167/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jagris:v:13:y:2023:i:1:p:167-:d:1030224

Access Statistics for this article

Agriculture is currently edited by Ms. Leda Xuan

More articles in Agriculture from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().