VIEW ARTICLE

Etiology

Partial Purification and Some Properties of Bamboo Mosaic Virus. M. T. Lin, Institute of Biological Sciences, University of Brasilia, 70.000 Brasilia, DF, Brazil; E. W. Kitajima(2), F. P. Cupertino(3), and C. L. Costa(4). (2)(3)(4)Institute of Biological Sciences, University of Brasilia, 70.000 Brasilia, DF, Brazil. Phytopathology 67:1439-1443. Accepted for publication 23 May 1977. Copyright © 1977 The American Phytopathological Society, 3340 Pilot Knob Road, St. Paul, MN 55121. All rights reserved.. DOI: 10.1094/Phyto-67-1439.

A rod shaped virus measuring 490 × 15nm was isolated from two species of bamboo, Bambusa multiplex and B. vulgaris, in Brasilia, Brazil. The virus could be transmitted mechanically to a cultivar of bamboo (B. vulgaris ‘vittatu’), Gomphrena globosa, and Chenopodium amaranticolor. The infected bamboos originally were introduced from the state of São Paulo and a field survey of 1,268 bamboo plants in areas near Brasilia showed none of them was infected with the virus. Thermal inactivation point of this virus was between 65 and 70 C. The virus lost infectivity in crude sap of bamboo when diluted to 10^–6, but not to 10^–5. In extracts of C. amaranticolor, however, it was still infectious at a dilution of 10^–7. The virus was partially purified and a virus-specific antiserum was obtained. Agar gel diffusion method was used successfully to detect this long rod-shaped virus. The virus did not react with antisera to three potexviruses in microprecipitin- or agar gel diffusion tests. This virus, named bamboo mosaic virus, is probably an undescribed virus and should be placed in the potexvirus group.