A root gall-producing nematode found in colder climates. Meloidogyne hapla strain:VW9

Root-knot nematodes (Meloidogyne spp.) are the most damaging and economically significant plant-parasitic nematodes worldwide. We have established Meloidogyne hapla as a tractable model plant-parasitic nematode amenable to forward and reverse genetics and we present a complete genome sequence. At 54 Mbp, M. hapla represents not only the smallest nematode genome yet completed, but also the smallest metazoan.