New Disease Reports (2003) 8, 14.

First report of Tobacco rattle virus occurring in Gladiolus in India

Meenu Katoch*, M.Z. Abdin and A.A. Zaidi

*meenusamiksha@rediffmail.com

Show affiliations

Accepted: 27 Oct 2003

During a survey for viruses infecting gladiolus (Gladiolus grandiflorus) in 2002, around Palampur in the Kangra Valley, some of plants were identified that showed notched leaf blade margin symptoms (Fig. 1), which is characteristic of Tobacco rattle virus (Genus Tobravirus; TRV) (Yamaji et al., 1998).

These symptoms were observed on the cultivars Top Brass, Aldebaran and Oscar. Using double antibody sandwich (DAS) ELISA, plants showing symptoms gave a positive reaction with polyclonal antibodies specific to TRV (obtained from Agdia, Elkhart, USA). After sap inoculation onto Nicotiana tabacum, characteristic TRV symptoms of necrotic local lesions, followed by systemic mottling were observed (Brunt et al., 1996). The presence of TRV in these plants was confirmed using DAS-ELISA. The results of these tests confirm the presence of TRV in gladiolus in India. TRV has previously been reported in gladiolus from other parts of world, including Holland, Israel, Egypt and Poland (Stein et al., 1995). However, this is the first report of the occurrence of TRV in gladiolus from India, and as far as the authors can determine the first formally published report of TRV in any crop in India.


References

  1. Brunt AA, Crabtree K, Dallwitz MJ, Gibbs AJ, Watson L, eds, 1996. Viruses of Plants: Descriptions and Lists from the VIDE database. Wallingford, UK: CAB International.
  2. Stein A, 1995. Gladiolus. In: Loebenstein G, Lawson RH, Brunt AA, eds. Virus and Virus-like Diseases of Bulb and Flower Crops. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, 281-92.
  3. Yamaji Y, Horikoshi K, Yamashita H, Matsumoto T, 1998. Detection of Tobacco rattle virus on gladiolus by RT-PCR. Research Bulletin of the Plant Protection Service Japan 34, 107-111.

This report was formally published in Plant Pathology

©2003 The Authors