Study on Sengon (Falcataria moluccana) Resistance to Boktor Pest (Xystrocera festiva) and Gall Rust (Uromycladium tepperianum)

Sengon is one of important fast growing legume species in Indonesia, grown either in monoculture or agroforestry system. However, its main pest and disease, Boktor stem borer (Xystrocera festiva) and gall rust disease are capable of destroying sengon plantation. Stem borer began attacking the 3-4 year old plants, and without adequate control of pests can ruin the entire crop. Meanwhile gall rust disease, caused by the fungus Uromycladium falcatarum, attacks plants at all ages, from seedlings in the nursery until mature plants in the field, also potentially could damage the entire crop. Observations in the field showed that both the boktor pests and gall rust disease could attack plants at the same time causing enormous economic losses. The main concern is that the effective control method both for pests and diseases is not yet available. In further research, molecular markers can potentially differentiate genetic profile or background or gene expressions encoding the phenotypes, in this case resistance to pest and diseases. Genomic and proteomic approaches are emerging that link the molecular and phenotypic bases of plant defenses and pathogen infection. Massively parallel sequencing of DNA using NGS is now an efficient route for generating enormous sequence collections.