DOI: 10.1111/jph.70052 ISSN: 0931-1785
Adenium obesum as a New Natural Host of Pelargonium Flower Break Virus
Vinicius Henrique Bello, Tatsuya Nagata, Jorge Alberto Marques Rezende, Elliot Watanabe Kitajima ABSTRACT
In 2023, Adenium obesum plants displaying virus‐like symptoms were observed in two locations in Brazil. High‐throughput sequencing (HTS) analysis of RNA‐Seq of one sample yielded a contig sequence of 3923 nucleotides (nt), showing 97.77% nt identity with the genome of pelargonium flower break virus (PFBV, genus Alphacarmovirus). Total RNA was also extracted from another sample, and the presence of PFBV was confirmed by the real‐time reverse transcription‐polymerase chain reaction (RT‐qPCR) in these two samples. Attempts of mechanical transmission were done by inoculating sap from infected A. obesum leaves to healthy seedlings of A. obesum and Pelargonium zonale, but were not successful. However, PFBV was transmitted by grafting from and to an A. obesum plant. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of PFBV infecting A. obesum plants.