eukaryotic organisms that are involved in causing or spreading disease
Fungi may not be our next of kin, but they are more closely related to animals than they are to plants. We also recognize that organisms traditionally studied as fungi belong to three very different unrelated groups: the true fungi in Kingdom Fungi (Eumycota), the Oomycetes, and the slime molds (Fig. 1).ungi are an important group of plant pathogensâmost plant diseases are caused by fungiâbut fewer than 10% of all known fungi can colonize living plants (Knogge, 1996). Plant pathogenic fungi represent a relatively small subset of those fungi that are associated with plants.