Opportunistic pathogen that causes soft rot disease in plants. Dickeya dadantii 3937

Dickeya dadantii strain 3937. Formerly Erwinia chrysanthemi, this strain (3937) is wild-type and was isolated from Saintpaulia plants. It is a well characterized strain and has been used extensively. It produces important exoenzymes, including 5 types of pectinases, pectin methylesterases and an acetylesterase for degradation of modified plant cell wall components. Recent taxonomic revisions have altered the name of this organism over the course of the genome project; This organism is now named Dickeya dadantii, but was previously named Erwinia chrysanthemi and Pectobacterium chrysanthemi. Dickeya dadantii is an important model system for studying the molecular basis and regulation of soft-rot pathogenesis. Soft-rot associated enterobacteria cause devastating disease on a wide range of plant host species including agriculturally important crops and ornamentals. Most of the genome sequencing took place at The Institute for Genomic Reasearch (TIGR) with final gap closure and finishing at the University of Wisconsin. An international network of collaborators worked with GEL personnel to annotate and analyze this genome sequence.