Plant Virology Lab, Institute of Himalayan Bioresource Technology, Palampur-176 061, India.
Abstracts of the papers presented at the XVIII National Conference of Indian Virological Society at Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, India, December 11–13, 2008.
A survey was undertaken in the temperate fruit growing regions of Himachal Pradesh (HP) and Jammu & Kashmir (J&K). Apple stem grooving virus (ASGV), a Capillovirus, was detected in eleven different cultivars of apple, nectarines, plum, cherry, quince and apricots by Double antibody sandwich indirect ELISA. The sequence of an amplicon produced by RT-PCR using ASGV-CP primer confirmed ELISA results for the apple cultivar Starkrimson collected from the state of Himachal Pradesh. The Indian ASGV isolate shared perfect sequence identity with the Brazilian isolate. Sequence analysis by Recombination Detection Programme (RDP2) indicated no recombination event for the Indian isolate. However, recombination was detected in Chinese-Korean and Citrus tatter leaf virus (CTLV)-Taiwan strains of ASGV. Here we report characterization of the coat protein gene of ASGV Indian isolate as well as results of a restricted survey on ASGV infection status in India.
