Prof Brenda Wingfield

Academic Staff

Research Interests

My research focus is in fungal population genetics and genomics. This includes research on genetic variation within as well as between species. Thus, a certain component of the work done in my group could also be considered to be molecular taxonomy. I also, however, have an interest in basic evolutionary biology particularly in terms of fungal tree pathogens and close relatives. I thus have a variety of collaborations with research groups working on a spectrum of different fungal pathogens. Much of this collaboration is in association with the tree pathology research group and the Centre of Excellence in Tree Health Biotechnology. The emphasis of my research has thus been on important plant and tree pathogens.

Understanding the population diversity of a pathogen is an important aspect of being able to control the degree of disease and disease spread. The genetic diversity of a pathogen is not only determined by the genetic material in the fungal genome. In addition to the mitochondrial genomes which we study fungi also have extrachromosomal nucleic acid, the most common of which is dsRNA. In some fungi this dsRNA has been shown to be associated with hypovirulence. We are also investigating the presence of dsRNA in South Africa's more important tree pathogens.

In 2009 we sequenced the first eukaryotic genome in Africa. This was the genome of the pine pathogen Fusarium circinatum. This genome has now been annotated and a considerable amount of research is being done to fully characterize this genome. We have also embarked on a project to characterize a number of Ceratocystis genomes. As more fungal genomes become available the power of comparative genomics increases exponentially. We anticipate that these kinds of comparative studies will provide us with a far greater understanding of these pathogens and in so doing we will be able to contribute significantly to reducing the impact of fungal tree disease.

Scopus Author ID
Prof Brenda Wingfield's CV