Molecular identification of Oat mosaic virus as a Bymovirus

A partial sequence of Oat mosaic virus (OMV) has been obtained for four iso lates of the virus from four European countries. This represents the first available sequence data for this important disease of winter-sown oats. The longest clone of 1699 nucleotides was obtained from infected English oats using a degenerate primer, designed to members of the Potyviridae family. A lignment of the predicted amino acid sequence with members of the Potyvirid ae showed closest identity with viruses of the Bymovirus genus. The predict ed amino acid sequence has one open reading frame corresponding to part of the NIb and capsid protein, with a 3' untranslated region of 351 nucleotide s, followed by a poly(A) tail. PCR primers were designed to the coat protei n and NIb gene of members of the Bymovirus genus and used to obtain partial sequences of 1441 nucleotides at the 3' end of infected oats from both Wal es and France. A specific primer set designed to the English isolate was us ed to generate a product of 701 nucleotides from OMV-infected oat leaves fr om Ireland. All four isolates are highly conserved at the amino acid level.