Yh. Hsu et al., A sensitive method for detecting bamboo mosaic virus (BaMV) and establishment of BaMV-free meristem-tip cultures, PLANT PATH, 49(1), 2000, pp. 101-107
A sensitive method was used to detect bamboo mosaic virus (BaMV) and its as
sociated satellite RNA (satBaMV) by P-32- and digoxigenin (Dig)-labelled pr
obes synthesized from cDNA clones of BaMV genomic (L probe) and satBaMV (S
probe) RNA. Both the P-32- and Dig-labelled L and S probes could detect as
little as 490 pg of BaMV viral RNA by slot- and dot-blot hybridization. In
infected leaf extracts, P-32-labelled L and S probes detected virus at 25-f
old higher dilutions than Dig-labelled probes, which were also successfully
used to detect BaMV infection in plants derived from meristem-tip culture.
However, immunoassays failed to detect BaMV in meristem culture. By dot-bl
ot hybridization assays, 25% of the seedlings were shown to be virus-free.
These results suggest that a highly sensitive method for the detection of B
aMV infection is required for the establishment of BaMV-free cultures. Meri
stem-tip culture also provides an efficient method for obtaining virus-free
bamboo plants.