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Developing a model for forest pathology means choosing tractable pathogens & hosts, building genetic tools, infection assays, and community standards—just like in crop research.

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Model organisms like Arabidopsis, Magnaporthe, and Ustilago transformed biology & agriculture. Forest pathogens, with their complex life cycles, long-lived hosts, & ecological nuance, need similar tools—built for trees.

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Forests face escalating threats from pathogens due to climate change & global trade. Yet forest pathology lags behind crop science in understanding microbe-host dynamics at the molecular level. Why? We lack the model systems that revolutionized plant pathology.

Forests are under increasing pressure from climate change, pests & pathogens. This paper is a call to action to develop a forest pathology molecular model system to study the fundamental mechanisms of these interactions. We propose a framework for it.
nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...