A new Washington State University-led project will help potato growers safeguard domestic and international markets and maintain high-quality potatoes for consumers around the world, according to a press release.
“We need to detect pathogens early, accurately, and quickly to avoid large crop losses, helping fewer people around the world go hungry,” said Chakradhar Mattupalli, an assistant professor of plant pathology at the WSU Mount Vernon Northwestern Washington Research and Extension Center.
Supported by nearly $1 million from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture’s Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI), this three-year project aims to enhance disease testing for potato crops. The broader objective is to protect the U.S. food supply from biological threats.
Potato farmers are required to test their crops for viruses and other pathogens to ensure they remain disease-free. Left unchecked, viral, bacterial, and fungal infections can lead to severe crop damage, resulting in significant financial and food losses.
A recently developed test by the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS) enables growers to collect crop samples, send the DNA and RNA to labs, and receive results within approximately two weeks.
Despite this advancement, the potato industry still lacks a comprehensive method for testing multiple pathogens on a nationwide scale, according to Mattupalli.
“It’s a huge advantage when you don’t have to ship potatoes to testing locations and wait so long to get results,” he said. “It took many years to develop this pathogen detection protocol, so now we want to expand this testing ability to make sure all potato growers benefit.”
Transitioning to the new USDA-ARS testing process will protect the U.S. potato industry and increase growers’ ability to respond rapidly to existing and emerging issues.
The project has three primary objectives:
1: Develop a testing lab to check large volumes of potato samples for viruses.
2: Investigate if the testing protocol for viruses in potatoes can be expanded to detect fungal or bacterial pathogens.
3: Create training opportunities for students and field personnel on how to properly collect samples from plants and how to ship them to the lab for testing.
Leading the work with USDA-ARS colleagues in Ithaca, New York, and at Colorado State University, Mattupalli hopes to discover if this type of testing works for other crops.
“If we develop a sample collection and preservation system that works in potatoes, we want to see if it will work in other field and small fruit crops such as wheat and blueberries,” he said.
