Maintaining access to foreign germplasm by developing methods to detect unidentified viruses in sugarcane in quarantine : SRDC final report BS116S

Abstract

Four types of gneeric tests for detecting unidentified viruses in plants were trialed for their suitability for sugarcane. The tests were; double stranded RNA (dsRNA) analysis, sap inoculation of indicator plants, sap examination by electron microscopy and polymerisation chain reaction (PCR) amplification using 'group-specific' primers. The aim of this project was to develop and implement general diagnostic tests for unidentified viruses in sugarcane germplasm held in quarantine. The availability of these general tests has provided an opportunity to significantly improve the security of sugarcane quarantine.