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Engineered Resistance to Tobamoviruses

Accepted version
Peer-reviewed

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Article

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Abstract

jats:pTobacco mosaic virus (TMV) was the first virus to be studied in detail and, for many years, TMV and other tobamoviruses, particularly tomato mosaic virus (ToMV) and tobamoviruses infecting pepper (Capsicum spp.), were serious crop pathogens. By the end of the twentieth and for the first decade of the twenty-first century, tobamoviruses were under some degree of control due to introgression of resistance genes into commercial tomato and pepper lines. However, tobamoviruses remained important models for molecular biology, biotechnology and bio-nanotechnology. Recently, tobamoviruses have again become serious crop pathogens due to the advent of tomato brown rugose fruit virus, which overcomes tomato resistance against TMV and ToMV, and the slow but apparently inexorable worldwide spread of cucumber green mottle mosaic virus, which threatens all cucurbit crops. This review discusses a range of mainly molecular biology-based approaches for protecting crops against tobamoviruses. These include cross-protection (using mild tobamovirus strains to ‘immunize’ plants against severe strains), expressing viral gene products in transgenic plants to inhibit the viral infection cycle, inducing RNA silencing against tobamoviruses by expressing virus-derived RNA sequences in planta or by direct application of double-stranded RNA molecules to non-engineered plants, gene editing of host susceptibility factors, and the transfer and optimization of natural resistance genes.</jats:p>

Description

Keywords

3108 Plant Biology, 31 Biological Sciences, Genetics, Emerging Infectious Diseases, Infectious Diseases, Biotechnology, 2.2 Factors relating to the physical environment, 2 Aetiology, Infection

Journal Title

Viruses

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

1999-4915
1999-4915

Volume Title

Publisher

MDPI AG
Sponsorship
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BB/R005397/1)
CONNECTED - COmmunity Network for africaN vECTor borne plant viruses, which was funded by the UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (ref. BB/R005397/1)