Plant Diseases: A Major Threat to Plant Life

Abstract

Plants, much like all the living beings on the earth are affected by some kind of external agents that interferes with their biochemical pathways in the body resulting in physiological impairments. The whole kingdom of plant diseases is subdivided mainly into two subgroups infectious and non-infectious disease. The occurrence of infectious disease occurs when plants are affected by pathogens like virus, bacteria, fungus, mycoplasma, viroid, parasitic and nematoid. Non-infectious diseases of the plant are mainly caused due to unsuitable climate and weather, improper soil for plant growth, absence of required minerals, and imbalance of moisture and oxygen in the atmosphere. The only major difference between both modes of disease is the capacity to transmit the disease. Infectious diseases are caused by living organisms and hence they can transmit easily and are termed as infectious whereas non-infectious diseases do not possess such capability maybe because they are caused by the harshness of natural conditions and not through any living organism.