Study on the occurrence of some important viral pathogens infecting pepper in varamin area

Subject Areas : Plant Pests

Azin Aghazadeh ¹ , Mojdeh Maleki ² , Ali Reza Golnaraghi ³

1 - Former MSc. Student , Department of Plant Pathology, College of Agriculture, Varamin-Pishva Branch, Islamic Azad University, Varamin, Iran.
2 - Assistant Professor Department of Plant Pathology, College of Agriculture, Varamin-Pishva Branch, Islamic Azad University, Varamin, Iran.
3 - Assistant Professor, Department of Plant Protection, College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Tehran Science and Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran.

Received: 2013-12-01 Accepted : 2014-05-02 Published : 2014-06-22

Keywords: ELISA test, Viruses of pepper, universal primers, potyviruses, tobamoviruses,

Abstract :

Surveys were conducted to determine viral diseases of pepper plants (Capsicum annum) in different regions of Varamin county during the growing seasons of 2012-2014. A total of 110 pepper leaf samples and 11 weed leaf samples were collected from plants showing virus-like symptoms. The samples were tested by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) using antibodies produced against Cucumber mosaic virus (CMV), Potato virus X (PVX), Tobacco mosaic virus (TMV), Tomato mosaic virus (ToMV), Tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TYLCV), and the broad-spectrum antibodies reacting potyviruses. According to the ELISA results, virus infections were related to TMV (26.7%), followed by potyviruses (24.3%), TYLCV (23.8%), CMV (13.3%), ToMV (13.3%) and PVX (1.9%). Nearly, 64.1% of the pepper leaf samples were infected with vector-transmitted viruses and 34.5% with viruses having no known vectors for their transmission. The results also indicated that 21.0% and 77% of the samples had single and mixed virus infections. respectively The tobamovirus and potyvirus infections of the samples were confirmed by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) using previously described universal primer pairs Tob-Uni1/Tob-Uni2 and NIb2F/NIb3R, which resulted in the amplification of DNA fragments with the expected sizes of 800 bp and 350 bp, respectively. Moreover, the presence of TYLCV was confirmed by the amplification of DNA fragments with the expected size of ca. 670 bp by PCR using virus-specific primers TYLCV-Sar and TYLCV-Isr. This study showed a widespread occurrence of different viruses especially tobamoviruses and potyviruses in pepper fields of Varamin area. In the present work, the potyvirus infection of morning glory plant (Ipomoea purpurea) was also confirmed.