Biological control of weeds using plant pathogens: accomplishments and limitations

The science and technology of weed control by using plant pathogens gained attention and momentum in the 1970s when some century-old concepts in weed biocontrol and plant disease epidemiology were successfully put to test and a few economically important weeds were controlled by two different strate gies. Since then, researchers in different parts of the world have critical ly examined and tried to apply these strategies with the hope of solving so me of the most intractable weed problems. Depending on one "s point of view , this biological control approach has been quite successful or wrought wit h limitations. In this paper, we describe some of the accomplishments as we ll as the limitations in this field. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rig hts reserved.