First Report of Turnip mosaic virus in Rhubarb in Alaska

Plant Disease
N L Robertson, D C Ianson

Abstract

In July 2003, noticeable red lesions were observed on rhubarb leaves (Rheum rhababarum cv. Kerwin) from a plant at the Arctic Plant Germplasm Research and Introduction Project in Palmer, AK. Extracts of leaf tissue tested positive for a potyvirus using indirect enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and western blots with a monoclonal antibody specific to the potyvirus group (Agdia, Inc., Elkhart, IN). During the following growing season (June 2004), obvious chlorotic ringspots developed into red lesions on the same plant and an adjacent plant of the same cultivar. Partially purified particles that were isolated from the infected rhubarb plants were mechanically inoculated to an experimental host range (number of infected plants per total number of plants), resulting in lesions on leaves of Rheum palmatum (1 of 2) and Chenopodium amaranticolor (3 of 5) but none on C. quinoa (0 of 4). The leaves with local lesions from C. amaranticolor were ground in phosphate buffer (1 g of tissue per 10 ml of buffer), and the extract rubbed onto a set of plants resulting in lesions on R. hybridum (raponticum) (1 of 2), C. amaranticolor (1 of 4), and C. quinoa (1 of 4). The original diseased rhubarb plants and experimental symptomatic plants...Continue Reading

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