RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN C-6-C-12 ALKANAL AND ALKENAL VOLATILE CONTENTS AND RESISTANCE OF MAIZE GENOTYPES TO ASPERGILLUS-FLAVUS AND AFLATOXIN PRODUCTION

An association was found between C-6-C-12 alkanal and alkenal volatile contents in several maize genotypes and aflatoxin contamination. Vola tiles generated from untreated, ground, field resistant (R) maize kern els contained in an inverted lid of a Petri dish affected growth and a flatoxin production by Aspergillus flavus when spores were inoculated on potato dextrose agar in a closed, sealed Petri dish assay. Volatile s from the ground maize genotypes were purged onto Tenax columns and a nalyzed by GC/MS; C-6-C-12 aldehydes were more prominent in the GC/MS total ion chromatograms of the R genotypes. Maize genotypes that exhib ited a greater inhibition of aflatoxin production in the inverted lid assay also exhibited a larger concentration of linoleic acid in their fatty acid profiles. These results suggest the correlation of decay pr oducts of polyunsaturated fatty acids arid plant disease resistance an d indicate that the lipoxygenase pathway may contribute to this resist ance.