It takes years for X phytoplasma to make its presence apparent to the human eye — the small, poorly colored, off-tasting and unmarketable cherries that gave rise to the common name little cherry disease. That’s a real problem for growers trying to get ahead ol the pathogen’s spread in their orchards."We don’t have rapid, non-contact sensing for symptoms. We have visual scouting that is laborious,” said Lav Khot, associate professor of biological systems engineering at Washington State University. Meanwhile, sending samples to labs for PCR testingis expensive because of the skilled expertise required.
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