First Report of Tomato Leaf Curl Joydebpur Virus Infecting Chilli (Capsicum annuum) in Andaman and Nicobar Islands

Abstract

There has been no study demonstrating etiology of ChiLCD in Andaman and Nicobar Islands. During 2017, a survey was conducted at six different locations in Andaman and Nicobar Islands on leaf curl diseases of chillies. Symptoms such as mild to severe curling of leaves, reduction of leaf size, stunting of plant growth, clearing of veins and veinlets, thickening of leaves, enations, and chlorosis were observed on infected plants of all crop growth stages with incidence ranging from 35 to 68%. PCR assays with the Beta01/02 primer pair (Briddon et al. 2002) followed by sequencing (GenBank accession no. MN066162) confirmed the association of tomato leaf curl Joydebpur betasatellite (ToLCJoB) sharing 96.79% identity with GenBank accession no. JN176566. Previous studies demonstrated that begomovirus ToLCJoV was associated with leaf curl on chillies, tomato, and kenaf in mainland India (Paul et al. 2009; Shih et al. 2007; Tiwari et al. 2013). The present study confrms the infection of monopartite ToLCJoV in chilli plants affected by ChiLCD in Andaman and Nicobar Islands for the first time. ToLCJoV may expand its host range to other crops of the islands similar to the hosts that it infects in mainland India