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Etiology

Southern Bean Mosaic Virus: Evidence for Seed Transmission in Bean Embryos. J. K. Uyemoto, Department of Plant Pathology, New York State Agricultural Experiment Station, Geneva, NY 14456; R. G. Grogan, Department of Plant Pathology, University of California, Davis, CA 95616. Phytopathology 67:1190-1196. Accepted for publication 5 April 1977. Copyright © 1977 The American Phytopathological Society, 3340 Pilot Knob Road, St. Paul, MN 55121. All rights reserved.. DOI: 10.1094/Phyto-67-1190.

Three strains of southern bean mosaic virus (SBMV) were seed-transmitted through the embryos of three bean cultivars. Buffer extracts prepared from infected immature or mature embryos, but not from healthy embryos, were infectious. Decontaminated, infected embryos or infected intact seed also produced diseased seedlings. In all trials, however, SBMV was transmitted in higher frequency from immature seeds than from mature seeds. Attempts to increase the recovery of infectious SBMV from infected mature seeds by extraction of RNA or to detect inhibition of virus infectivity by lectins or seed extracts failed. Phenol extracts of infected seedcoats or embryos contained only a small fraction of the infectivity of buffer-extracted inoculum. Lectins, at low concentrations, tended to enhance SBMV infectivity; whereas seed extracts, but only at high concentrations, reduced lesion numbers.