Rust (fungus) Rust (fungus) Rusts are plant diseases caused by pathogenic fungi of the order Pucciniales (previously also known as Uredinales). An estimated 168 rust genera and approximately 7,000 species, more than half of which belong to the genus "Puccinia", are currently accepted. Rust fungi are highly specialized plant pathogens with several unique features. Taken as a group, rust fungi are diverse and affect many kinds of plants. However, each species has a very narrow range of hosts and cannot be transmitted to non-host plants. In addition, most rust fungi cannot be grown easily in pure culture. A single species of rust
True-breeding organism plants for gardeners are F1 hybrids, which if propagated from seed will produce F2 hydrids which are quite different from their parents; the F1 hybrids therefore don't breed true. True-breeding organism A true-breeding organism, sometimes also called a purebred, is an organism that always passes down certain phenotypic traits (i.e. physically expressed traits) to its offspring of many generations. An organism is referred to as true breeding for each trait to which this applies, and the term "true-breeding" is also used to describe individual genetic traits. In Mendelian genetics, this means that an organism must be homozygous for every trait