Tubercle disease (Xanthomonas beticola) and other gallmalformed diseases of sugar beet roots: A review

Abstract

The sugar beet (Beta vulgaris) is an important plant in agriculture and sugar industry, and it is widely cultivated in European countries. Getting proper raw material of sugar beets (roots) is a problem for agriculture. Some disease symptoms observed on sugar beet roots are atypical tumor-like deformations. The causative agent of these deformations is known in the old literature as Xanthomonas beticola. The disease’s name in Poland is "tuberkuloza" and in the USA it refers to a description of a pocket disease-therefore we may consider those diseases to be the same. The clear description of X. beticola disease can be found in many phytopathological manuals printed in the past and nowadays. Symptoms of the disease were noted in Poland last year, and the preliminary data of the yield quality show that the quality of diseased roots is worse (less sugar content) than of healthy roots. For the proper disease diagnoses, the literature was searched and this searching lead us to conclusion that there is no simple way to recognize the causal organism in the field conditions, and we suppose that X. beticola does not exist.