Plant Virology Lab, Institute of Himalayan Bioresource Technology, CSIR, 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.
Apple is one of the most important fruit crop commercially cultivated all over the world. In India it is grown in sub temperate and temperate zones of Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttarakhand and in some parts of North Eastern States. During extensive surveys in the apple orchards virus like symptoms were observed on the trees. Samples were tested from orchards and nursery (of cultivars and commercial rootstocks like Malling Merton (MM 106) & Budagovsky (B9) by ELISA and RT-PCR. Apple chlorotic leaf spot virus (ACLSV) and Apple mosaic virus (ApMV) were found infecting the above samples. Infected shoot cultures were established in media by nodal segments and shoot tip. Explants (meristems 1-2mm) were cultured in MS medium supplemented with BAP-1mg, NAA-0.05mg and ascorbic acid 100mg alongwith charcoal- 2gm/l. After about 8 weeks new shoots initiated from explants which were transferred to the proliferation media and tested and it was observed that cultures were not free from viruses. From these plants in culture, 0.2–0.5 mm meristem tips were excised and cultured in MS media. As meristem tip culture alone was not able to eradicate viruses, media was supplemented with viricides Ribavarin (10-40mg/l) and 2-Thio Uracil (10-50mg/l) and amantadine hydrochloride 10–100 mg/l. After 4 weeks these young shoots were again indexed by DAS-ELISA which showed ACLSV and AMV eradication in more than 50 to 65% of samples.
