Detection and Molecular Characterization of Phytoplasma and its Effect on the Vitamin and Fibers in Corchorus olitorius Crops in Egypt

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

Virus and Phytoplasma Research Department, Plant Pathology Research Institute, Agricultural Research Center (ARC), Giza, Egypt

Abstract

A phytoplasma was detected in the Corchorus olitorius (Mallow) crop in 2022 at Fayoum governorate, Egypt. Infected C. olitorius showed symptoms of phyllody, leaf deformations, and slight yellowing. Total DNA was extracted from symptomatic or asymptomatic leaf tissues and was tested for phytoplasma presence using nested polymerase chain reaction (PCR). A fragment was amplified from symptomatic samples using universal phytoplasma primer set P1/P7 and primer set R16F2n/R16R2. The amplicon for these primers is 1271 bp, but the DNA of asymptomatic samples did not yield an amplicon. The nested PCR products were sequenced with R16F2n/R16R2 primers, and then sequences were aligned through the DNA-man program V7. Based on the phytoplasma found in this study (Acc. No. OQ836595), the results imply 98.1% sequence identity with the phytoplasma of C. olitorius (OP889144) from Egypt, China (OP889144 and KM103730), and from other Indian crops. Identifying the vector species that is spreading the discovered phytoplasma in the Mallow crop is still necessary. Many active phytochemicals found in C. olitorius plants are of great interest due to their potential to improve human health. This study demonstrates that in plant leaves, phytoplasma presence lowered the tocopherol (Vitamin E) content and increased the crude fiber content.

Keywords

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics