Use of Internal Transcribed Spacer Primers and Fungicide Treatments to Study the Anther-Smut Disease, Microbotryum violaceum (=Ustilago violacea), of White Campion Silene alba (=Silene latifolia)

We report the construction and use of polymerase chain reaction (PCR) primers for detection of Microbotryum violaceum in Silene alba. Such primers show that the pathogen is present in the aboveground bud meristems, flower pedicels, and flower-stem internodes but not in the flowering-stem leaves and roots of flowering plants. Use of primers also showed that the pathogen was absent from plants that had been inoculated with the fungus but remained healthy. The fungicides Folicur and Bayleton cured plants of the disease, and the absence of the fungus from such cured plants was confirmed using the PCR primers.