Members of the genus Colletotrichum infect many commercially important crops and cause anthracnose disease. Colletotrichum species infect diverse hosts and/or adopt a variety of infection lifestyles. Even though most members are identified as hemibiotrophic plant pathogens, some species have been categorized as endophytes. In the past several years, it has been made possible to elucidate the molecular mechanisms underlying the host specificity or the diversity of different lifestyles by sequencing the genomes of different Colletotrichum species. This genome information enables us to relate genomic features to different Colletotrichum species phenotypes. In this review, we discuss recent comparative genomic analyses of the Colletotrichum genus.
