In Japan, to perform timely pest control is crucial for the prevention of wheat Fusarium Head Blight caused by pathogenic fungi. Flowering period of wheat is the most susceptible period to fungal infection as well as the best period for pest control. Last year, NARO released a series of WAGRI-API containing API09: Wheat Growth Prediction, as one of the public cloud services for the purpose of timely pest control. It offers a forecast of the anthesis by inputting a dissemination day of the relevant wheat cultivar and cultivation location (latitude and longitude).

  Japan relies heavily on imports of food and animal feed. Although it is important to understand the increased risk of aflatoxin (AF) contamination in imported foods and agricultural products, it is also necessary to confront the risk of domestic AF contamination caused by recent climate change. However, the accumulation of information regarding AF-producing fungi in Japan is still in the developmental stage. In this study, four sets of draft genome data are reported for Aspergillus flavus (A. flavus) that was isolated from residues in domestic rice-drying facilities. Of the four A. flavus strains, three were identified as AF-producing. The remaining non-AF-producing strain had a unique amino acid sequence resulting in the aberrant translation of AflR, which is predicted to inhibit AF synthesis. The three AF-producing strains also exhibited distinct AflR amino acid sequences, confirming the genetic diversity of the domestic strains. Although differences that would allow the identification of AF-producing strains were not confirmed in this study, the use of genome datasets will contribute to preventing AF contamination in domestic agricultural prod- ucts.

  “Narezushi” is the traditional local food, which is fermented fishes with cooked rice, and it is said to be the root of “Edo-mae sushi”. Currently, several kinds of narezushi are found all over Japan, and each have become one of the major local foods that symbolizes each region. For each narezushi, the safe and stable fermentation method had been established in each region over a long period in accordance with their climate and geography. And it seems that narezushi has evolved into their current forms with the traditional and food cultures in each region. In the mini review, it is explained “the fermentation science of narezushi”, such as “Kishu saba-narezushi” in the Hidaka region, Wakayama Prefecture, and “Gifu ayu-zushi”, Gifu Prefecture, Japan.

  Aspergillus section Flavi contains Aspergillus oryzae, an important species in Japanese traditional brewing, and also A. flavus, an aflatoxigenic species. Genetic discrimination of A. oryzae from A. flavus is very tough since they share over 99% sequence identity of their genome. Recently, cyp51A gene variants were reported to be a promising indicator to discriminate strains of A. oryzae from those of A. flavus. In this study, we applied the indicator for Japanese A. oryzae strains. Consequently, contradictory results were obtained for more than one Japanese A. oryzae strain.