Xylella genomics and bacterial pathogenicity to plants

Abstract

Xylella fastiiliosa, a pathogen of citrus, is the first plant pathogenic bacterium for which the complete genome sequence has been published. Inspection of the sequence reveals high relatedness to many genes of other pathogens, notably Xanthomonas campcstris. Based on this, we suggest that Xylella possesses certain easily testable properties that contribute to pathogenicity. We also present some general considerations for deriving information on pathogenicity from bacterial genomics. Copyright ©2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.