Aspergillus flavus
Pathology
A. flavus is an opportunistic pathogen, which allows it to infect animals, humans and plants. It is not virulent in healthy viable tissues. A. flavus targets seeds with poor viability. It infects seeds by entering wounds and holes from which insect larval have exited, and by entering from the vascular tissue. A. flavus can infect plants via its seeds or by being carried to the surface of the plant by insects or wind. Also it can be colonized but not infected until the plant is matured. A. flavus infects cotton by entering from natural openings and traveling up into the boll. In the boll the fungus can be there for twenty five days, not infecting the boll until matures. In peanuts the fungus can infect seeds as well as the plant by penetrating the pods that peanuts grow in.[1]
In humans A. flavus is associated with aflatoxicosis. Symptoms of aflatoxicosis are abdominal pain, vomiting, pulmonary edema, convulsions, coma, liver damage, and death. Cite error: Closing </ref> missing for <ref> tag A. flavus is also an allergen. It causes allergic bronchopulmonary aspergillosis. 5
- ↑ [KLICH M. Aspergillus flavus: the major producer of aflatoxin. Molecular Plant Pathology [serial online]. November 2007;8(6):713-722. Available from: Academic Search Premier, Ipswich, MA. Accessed April 15, 2009]