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Serological, Physical, and Chemical Properties of Strains of Cherry Leaf Roll Virus. D. G. A. Walkey, Postdoctorate Fellow, Research Station, Canada Agriculture, 6660 N.W. Marine Drive, Vancouver 8, British Columbia; R. Stace-Smith(2), and J. H. Tremaine(3). (2)(3)Research Scientists, Research Station, Canada Agriculture, 6660 N.W. Marine Drive, Vancouver 8, British Columbia. Phytopathology 63:566-571. Accepted for publication 13 November 1972. DOI: 10.1094/Phyto-63-566.

Serological tests with strains of cherry leaf roll virus isolated from cherry, rhubarb, golden elderberry, dogwood and elm showed that the dogwood and elm strains were closely related; the cherry strain more closely related to dogwood than to elm; and the rhubarb and golden elderberry strains more closely related to each other than to the other three strains. The five strains consisted of three viral components with sedimentation coefficients of approximately 52 S, 114 S, and 132 S. The top component was not infective, but the middle and bottom components were infective, serologically identical and had similar ultraviolet absorption spectra. The lysine content of the dogwood, elm and golden elderberry strains was significantly lower than that of the rhubarb and cherry strain. The molecular weight of the protein subunits of the complete virus of each strain was 55,000. The dogwood and elm strains moved towards the anode in agar electrophoresis at pH 6.5, whereas the rhubarb, golden elderberry and cherry strains moved to the cathode. Each strain produced two serologically distinct electrophoretic components. Two bands with molecular weights of 2.1 and 2.3 × 10⁶ daltons were formed when RNA of the golden elderberry strain was run in polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. The base percentage composition of the middle and bottom components of golden elderberry strain was: G = 26.61; A = 21.41; C = 22.76; U = 29.22 and G = 26.55; A = 22.01; C = 22.32; U = 29.12, respectively.