Sugarcane is one of Australia’s major agricultural industries, with approximately 95% of the crop being grown in Queensland and the remainder in northern New South Wales. In the last decade of the nineteenth century, cane growers in northern New South Wales started to see a new disease that resulted not only in the death of plants but also in difficulties in the extraction of sugar. Theories about the cause abounded, but investigations by the New South Wales vegetable pathologist Nathan Cobb revealed that the disease, previously unknown to the world, was caused by a microbe in the creamy ‘gum’ that could be commonly found in the vascular tissues of affected stalks. He named the organism Bacillus vascularum (now known as Xanthomonas axonopodis pv. vasculorum). For some time after, the disease was known as ‘Cobb’s gumming disease of sugarcane’. The Australian bacteriologist Robert Greig-Smith was not convinced that Cobb had conclusively demonstrated that B. vascularum was the culprit, mainly because he did not satisfy Koch’s Postulates. However, the American bacteriologist Erwin Frink Smith came to Cobb’s rescue when he proved beyond doubt that B. vascularum was to blame. The disease is now known simply as ‘gumming disease of sugarcane’.

甘蔗是澳大利亚的主要农业产业之一，大约 95% 的作物种植在昆士兰州，其余的种植在新南威尔士州北部。在十九世纪最后十年，新南威尔士州北部的甘蔗种植者开始发现一种新疾病，这种疾病不仅导致植物死亡，而且导致糖分提取困难。关于其原因的理论有很多，但新南威尔士州蔬菜病理学家内森·科布的调查显示，这种以前不为世人所知的疾病是由奶油状“口香糖”中的一种微生物引起的，这种微生物常见于受影响的植物的血管组织中。茎。他将这种生物体命名为血管芽孢杆菌（现称为Xanthomonas axonopodis pv. vasculorum）。此后一段时间，这种疾病被称为“甘蔗柯布胶病”。澳大利亚细菌学家罗伯特·格雷格-史密斯并不相信科布已最终证明维管芽孢杆菌是罪魁祸首，主要是因为他不满足科赫假设。然而，美国细菌学家欧文·弗林克·史密斯（Erwin Frink Smith）拯救了科布，他毫无疑问地证明了维管芽孢杆菌是罪魁祸首。这种疾病现在简称为“甘蔗流胶病”。