Hochschule Geisenheim University, Geisenheim, Germany
*Corresponding author e-mail: Holger Linck (email: Holger.Linck@hs-gm.de)
Online published on 2 January, 2015.
Rubus stunt is an economically important disease in the production of raspberries, blackberries, and loganberries. A fast, sensitive, and reliable detection of phytoplasmas, the agents associated with the disease, is of prime importance to stop its spread by vegetative propagation and by insect vectors. Therefore, two multiplex qPCR assays using TaqMan probes in combination with up to four different kinds of fluorophores in the same reaction were developed, allowing the detection of phytoplasmas. Moreover the specific detection of different phytoplasma groups that have previously been identified in Rubus species was achieved. This assay is applied to monitor presence and distribution of phytoplasmas in Rubus plants of different geographic origins, cultivars and cultivation systems as well as in putative insect vectors.
Phytoplasma, rubus stunt, insect vectors, real-time PCR, taqMan, detection
