Corn smut - Definition and Overview

Corn smut is a fungus, Ustilago maydis, which damages maize and sweet corn. Spores can infect any part of the corn, but usually end up on the kernels, where they form "galls" and replace the kernels themselves with large greyish lumps.

Considered a pest in most of the United States, smut feeds off the corn plant and decrease the yield. Usually smut-infected crops are destroyed.

However in Mexico corn smut is called huitlacoche (IPA [wi.t͡ɬa.ko.t͡ɕe]), and is considered a delicacy, even being preserved and sold for a higher price than corn. It is sometimes spelled cuitlacoche.

Huitlacoche grows best during times of drought in a 78°F to 93°F temperature range. Aztecs purposely innoculated corn with the spores by scratching their corn plants at the soil level with a knife—thereby allowing the water-borne spores easy entrance into the plant.

Rumor has it that the USDA started an experimental program to allow farmers in Pennsylvania and Florida to cultivate the "corn truffle."

The fungus is used as a model organism in the study of genetics and fungal infections, and its genome is being sequenced as part of the Fungal Genome Initiative.

Classification

• Kingdom: Fungi
• Phylum: Basidiomycota
• Class: Basidiomycetes
• Order: Ustilaginales
• Family: Ustilaginaceae
• Genus: Ustilago (Persoon) Roussel 1806

External links

• Corn Smut Recipes (http://www.sweetcorn.uiuc.edu/Common-smut/Recipes.htm)
• Smuts on the Internet (http://botit.botany.wisc.edu/toms_fungi/march98.html)
• Ustilago maydis Database at Broad Institute (http://www.broad.mit.edu/annotation/fungi/ustilago_maydis/)