Identification and Characterization of Causing Leaf Blight on White Spider Lilies ( and ) in Malaysia.

and , commonly known as spider lilies are bulbous perennial and herbaceous plants that widely planted in Malaysia as ornamental. During 2015-2016, symptom of leaf blight was noticed on the hosts from several locations in Penang. The symptom appeared as irregular brown to reddish lesions surrounded by yellow halos. As the disease progressed, the infected leaves became blighted, dried, and fell off with the presence of black microsclerotia and pycnidia on the lesions parts. The present study was conducted to investigate the causal pathogen of leaf blight on and . Based on morphological characteristics and DNA sequences of internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region and translation elongation factor 1-alpha (TEF1-α) gene, the causal pathogen was identified as . Phylogenetic analysis of combined dataset of ITS and TEF1-α grouped the isolates studied with other isolates of from GenBank. The grouping of the isolates was supported by 96% bootstrap value. Pathogenicity test proved the role of the fungus in causing leaf blight on both hosts.