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ARS Home » Northeast Area » Frederick, Maryland » Foreign Disease-Weed Science Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #408378
Research Project: Developing Genomic and Biological Resources to Characterize, Diagnose and Detect Emerging and Invasive Vectored Bacterial and Viral Plant Pathogens for Safeguarding U.S. Agriculture

Location: Foreign Disease-Weed Science Research

Title: Almond can be infected by Plum Pox Virus-D isolate Penn4 and is a transmission-competent host

Author
item Rogers, Elizabeth
item Stone, Andrew
item Burchard, Erik
item Sherman, Diana
item Dardick, Christopher - Chris

Submitted to: Plant Disease
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 2/12/2024
Publication Date: 5/31/2024
Citation: Rogers, E.E., Stone, A.L., Burchard, E.A., Sherman, D.J., Dardick, C.D. 2024. Almond can be infected by Plum Pox Virus-D isolate Penn4 and is a transmission-competent host. Plant Disease. https://doi.org/10.1094/PDIS-09-23-1910-SC.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1094/PDIS-09-23-1910-SC

Interpretive Summary: Plum Pox Virus (PPV) is very damaging to peaches, plums, and other stone fruit. PPV is widely found in all major stone fruit production areas worldwide except for the United States. Almonds are also stone fruits and there are conflicting reports in the scientific literature about whether almonds are susceptible to PPV. This study demonstrates that two different almond cultivars can be infected by an isolate of PPV originally found in Pennsylvania (and since eradicated). In addition, we demonstrated that at least one of these almonds can serve as a source of PPV for aphid transmission of the virus to other stone fruit. These results have important implications for California where almonds are grown in close proximity to other stone fruit and have a total production value of more than $5 billion annually. These results demonstrate that it is important to monitor almond orchards for the presence of PPV because almonds could harbor the virus and allow it to spread to more susceptible stone fruit like peaches and plums.

Technical Abstract: There is conflicting evidence about the susceptibility of almonds (Prunus dulcis) to plum pox virus (PPV). Here, we demonstrate that both Tuono and Texas Mission cultivars can be infected by the U.S. isolate PPV-D Penn4 and that Tuono is a transmission-competent host, capable of serving as a source of inoculum for aphid transmission of the virus. These results have important implications for the effort to keep PPV out of the U.S. and highlight the need to use multiple viral isolates when testing host susceptibility.