Destructive parasitic fungi causing brown rot in plants

Wiktionary Word definitions in Wiktionary
n. Any of many parasitic fungus, of the genus (taxlink Phytophthora genus noshow=1), that cause brown rot in plants.

Wikipedia Word definitions in Wikipedia
Phytophthora (from Greek φυτόν ( phytón ), “plant” and φθορά ( phthorá ), “destruction”; “the plant-destroyer”) is a genus of plant-damaging Oomycetes (water molds), whose member species are capable of causing enormous economic losses on crops worldwide, ...