**6. Postharvest fungal diseases**

Common postharvest diseases resulting from wound infections initiated during and after harvest includes blue and green mold (*Penicillium* spp.) and transit rot (*Rhizopus stolonifer*). Important fungal genera of anamorphic postharvest pathogens include *Penicillium*, *Aspergillus*, *Geotrichum*, *Botrytis*, *Fusarium*, *Alternaria*,

*Colletotrichum*, *Phomopsis*, *Rhizoctonia*, *Sclerotium,* and *Sclerotinia.* The most important pathosystem of postharvest vegetables are gray mold (*Botrytis* spp.), white mold and watery soft rot (*Sclerotinia* spp.), cottony leak (*Pythium* spp.) and *Sclerotium* rot (*Sclerotium rolfsii*) [6].

### **6.1** *Sclerotinia***: rot**

White mold (*Sclerotinia sclerotiorum*) appears in warm and moist weather (>95% relative humidity) and favors fungal growth on infected pods which develops as a white, fluffy mycelial mat often with large, irregular, black-colored sclerotia, typical of *S. sclerotiorum* [11–13]. Within the superficial mycelium, initially white but later hard dark black sclerotia are formed. Infected pods show brown discoloration and soft rot. The isolated fungus was identified as *S. sclerotiorum* based on morphological and cultural characteristics of the mycelia and sclerotia (**Figure 1**) [14].
