Intercontinental dissemination and diversification of Xanthomonas perforans in tomato production

Hybrid tomato production uses international breeding and production chains and a global network to deliver seeds to growers. Xanthomonas perforans, one of the causal agents of bacterial spot of tomato, is seedborne and has rapidly emerged and displaced other bacterial spot xanthomonads around the world. The objectives of this work were to examine genetic relatedness of strains collected in tomato seed production areas and other tomato production regions by analyzing the genomes of strains collected globally.