Prerequisite:
PlPa 5201 (3 credits) Biology of Plant Disease or equivalent and BioC 4125 Laboratory in Molecular Biology and Biotechnology or equivalent.

Total Plant Pathology (PlPa) course credits needed: 17.
These include the Plant Pathology courses required for the M.S. degree with Emphasis in Molecular Plant Pathology. These courses can be taken before admission to the Ph.D. program as part of M.S. requirements.

Courses required:

• PlPa 5301 (3 credits) Plant Genomics
• PlPa 5303/8302) (3 credits) Genomics of Plant-Associated Microbes. Must be taken in conjunction with PlPa (5300) Current Topics in Molecular Plant Pathology*PlPa 8103 (3 credits) Physiological and Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions
•  PlPa 5102/8102 (3 credits) Epidemiology and Genetics of Host-Parasite Interactions
• PlPa 8200 (2 credits) Seminar 
• PlPa 8005 (2 credits) Supervised Classroom or Extension Teaching Experience
  

* One credit is required during the Ph.D. program in addition to any prior credit for this course obtained at the MS level.

Thesis Research:
PlPa 8888 Thesis Research – (24 credits total)

Laboratory Rotations:
With approval of the Director of Graduate Studies, Ph.D. students pursuing the Emphasis in Molecular Plant Pathology may, in their first year of residence conduct research in up to three different labs as part of a rotation. The effort will be equivalent to a half-time research assistantship. The purpose of the rotation is to broaden the students' background in laboratory methods and research approaches before beginning Ph.D. thesis research.

To meet the Graduate School Ph.D. requirements, 12 credits are needed in one or more related fields outside the major.
Suggested Courses:

• Agro 8241 (3 credits) Molecular and Cellular Genetics of Plant Improvement
• Agro 8231 (4 credits) Cytogenetics
• AnSc/MVB 5200 (4 credits) Statistical Genetics and Genomics
• BioC 5361 (3 credits) Microbial Genomics
• Csci 5481 (3 credits) Computational Techniques for Genomics
• EEB 5221 (3 credits) Molecular and Genomic Evolution
• GCD 5036 (3 credits) Molecular Cell Biology
• GCD 8121 (3 credits) Advanced Molecular Genetics
• MICa 8002 (4 credits) Structure, Function, and Genetics of Bacteria and Viruses
• MICa 8006 (3 credits) Protein Sequence Analysis
• Pbio 5414 (3 credits) Plant Cell and Molecular Biology