Obermeier, C., Hunter, Paul J., Machado, R., Ohshima, Kazusato, Kearsey, M. J. and Walsh, John A. (2008) Plant – virus co-evolution in wild brassicas. In: 3rd Conference of the International Working Group on Legume and Vegetable Viruses (IWGLVV) , Ljubljana, Slovenia, 20th – 23rd Aug, 2008 . Published in: Proceedings of the 3rd Conference of the International Working Group on Legume and Vegetable Viruses (IWGLVV) p. 23.

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Abstract

Pathogens are key players in the ecology of higher plants; they have been shown to have a significant impact on
the structure of plant communities. RNA plant viruses provide an excellent model to study the co-evolution of
pathogens and their natural wild host communities due to their obligate dependency on host cellular machinery,
small genomes, relatively high mutation rates and short generation cycles. The evolution of viruses in wild plants
has obvious relevance for virus infection and disease epidemiology in crop plants. Surprisingly little information is available on the population dynamics, evolution and ecology of viruses in their natural wild host plant
communities.
We have been studying the co-evolution between Turnip mosaic virus (TuMV) and wild cabbage (Brassica
oleracea ssp. oleracea) (Raybould et al. 2003). TuMV is a member of the Potyvirus genus, infects a wide range of
cultivated and wild plant species (Walsh and Jenner, 2002). It is a positive strand RNA virus (genome comprises
9830-9835 nucleotides) and is the subject of advanced molecular characterisation in terms of its interaction with
brassicas (Walsh & Jenner, 2002). References to wild cabbage cultivation date back many centuries up to the
ancient Greek and Roman empires and it has been suggested that the wild populations found in the UK were
probably introduced at the time of the Roman occupation of Britain, or during Saxon invasions. Several
populations exist in the UK, some with provenance traceable back as far as 1551. Wild derivatives of cultivated
cabbages (i.e. escapes from cultivation) have been reported to become morphologically indistinguishable from
"native" populations within a few years, leading to confusion over the status of some populations. Several wild
cabbage populations are situated on the chalk cliffs of the Dorset coast. A number of virus species including
TuMV, Beet western yellows virus (BWYV), Cauliflower mosaic virus (CaMV) and Turnip yellow mosaic virus
(TYMV) are known to be present in these populations, although considerable site-to-site differences in virus
incidences have been reported (Raybould et al. 1999).
Different wild cabbage communities show big differences in the degree of diversity of the TuMV isolates infecting
them. At one site there was very little genetic diversity and no detectable pathotypic diversity, whereas at another,
distant site, there was a high degree of genetic diversity and some pathotypic diversity. Competition experiments
were carried out between pairs of isolates to determine the relative fitness of the isolates in plants grown from
seed collected from two sites.

Item Type:	Conference Item (UNSPECIFIED)
Subjects:	Q Science > Q Science (General)
Divisions:	Faculty of Science, Engineering and Medicine > Science > Life Sciences (2010- ) > Warwick HRI (2004-2010)
Journal or Publication Title:	Proceedings of the 3rd Conference of the International Working Group on Legume and Vegetable Viruses (IWGLVV)
Publisher:	National Institute of Biology Department of Biotechnology and Systems Biolog
Official Date:	2008
Dates:	Date Event 2008 Published
Page Range:	p. 23
Status:	Not Peer Reviewed
Publication Status:	Published
Access rights to Published version:	Restricted or Subscription Access
Title of Event:	3rd Conference of the International Working Group on Legume and Vegetable Viruses (IWGLVV)
Type of Event:	Conference
Location of Event:	Ljubljana, Slovenia
Date(s) of Event:	20th – 23rd Aug, 2008

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