Screening for polerovirus recombination under high selection pressure using Agrobacterium mediated expression (M.Sc.)
Start:
as of now
Support:
Dr. Lukas Rollwage
Contact:
rollwage@ifz-goettingen.deDepartment:
PhytopathologyQuestion:
Beet chlorosis virus (BChV) and beet mild yellowing virus (BMYV) are closely related species of the genus Polerovirus and cause the virus yellows diseases in sugar beet. They are frequently reported to occur in mixed infections. Thus, the occurrence of interspecific recombination between BChV and BMYV has been documented in natural habitats (Kozlowska-Makulska et al., 2015), raising questions on biological properties of recombinants including their pathogenicity and impact. However, recombinant isolates are lacking and more, the detection of these recombinants via PCR from naturally co-infected plants has the risk of producing artefacts due to the polymerases template switching ability, which could result in false positivein vitro recombinants. We would like to further develop our new screening system, which allows to screen for polerovirus recombination under high selection pressure using Agrobacterium meditated expression of fragmented viral genomes.