Current Topics in Fungal Biology

Current Topics in Fungal Biology

Spring semesters
Wednesdays 1:30, 336 Plant Science

Profs. Kathie T. Hodge and B. Gillian Turgeon

We meet weekly each Spring semester to discuss current scientific articles on the biology of fungi. The course is primarily for graduate students, but we welcome undergraduates, postdocs, staff, and guests who have an interest in fungi. Some background in mycology or plant pathology and in molecular genetics is assumed. We use a discussion format like the one proposed by Vicki Cameron of Ithaca College. It means that every student participates in presenting and critiquing every paper.

2008 Readings by week
click to access password-protected assignments and literature

Feb. 13	Natural history and evolutionary principles of gene duplication in fungi. Wapinski et al. Nature 449, 54-61 (6 September 2007) Supplementary notes and figures available via Nature.
Feb. 20	Identification of the sex genes in an early diverged fungus. (click to see which bit you've been assigned) Idnurm et al. Nature 451: 193-7 (10 Jan 2008) + Suppl. Materials Rapid and Recent Changes in Fungal Fruiting Patterns Gange et al. Science 316: 71 (6 Apr 2007) + Suppl. Materials
Feb. 27	Gene family encoding the major toxins of lethal Amanita mushrooms. (no assignments this week) Hallen et al. PNAS 104: 19097–19101 (Nov 2007)
March 5	A guardian of grasses: Specific origin and conservation of a unique disease-resistance gene in the grass lineage. (open access) Sindhu et al. PNAS 105: 1762-1767 (Feb 2008)
March 12	Insights from Sequencing Fungal and Oomycete Genomes: What can we learn about plant disease and the evolution of pathogenicity? Darren Soanes, Thomas Richards, & Nicholas Talbot The Plant Cell 19 : 3318- (Nov 2007)
March 19	no class: Spring Break.
March 26	On the Origin and Spread of the Scab Disease of Apple: Out of Central Asia (open access) Gladieux et al. PLoS ONE 3(1): e1455 (Jan 2008)
April 2	RXLR effector reservoir in two Phytophthora species is dominated by a single rapidly evolving superfamily with more than 700 members Jiang et al. PNAS 105(12): 4874-4879 (Mar 25 2008) note: senior author, Brett Tyler, will present a seminar in our dept on April 16
April 9	The genome of Laccaria bicolor provides insights into mycorrhizal symbiosis F. Martin et al. Nature 452 (Mar 6 2008)
April 16	No reading today but join us in rm 336 for pizza lunch with Dr. Brett Tyler (after his 12:20 seminar in rm. 401)
April 23	Evidence for horizontal transfer of a secondary metabolite gene cluster between fungi (open access) Khaldi et al. Genome Biology 9(1): R18 (Jan 24 2008)
April 30	The Chemical Genomic Portrait of Yeast: Uncovering a Phenotype for All Genes Hillenmeyer et al. Science 20: 362-365 (18 April 2008)

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