The noxious fungus is known to cause "head blight," a disease that impacts barley, rice, wheat and maize and causes economic losses worth billions of dollars each year, according to a release.

Fusarium graminearum — the fungus federal prosecutors say a University of Michigan scholar and her boyfriend attempted to smuggle into the U.S. — is a dangerous strain of a common fungus that can infect wheat, rice, oats and other cereal plants. It can cause devastating crop damage and potentially make infected grains dangerous to eat.