VIEW ARTICLE

Etiology

Purification and Some Properties of Rice Gall Dwarf Virus, a New Phytoreovirus. T. Omura, Institute for Plant Virus Research, Tsukuba Science City, Yatabe, Ibaraki 305, Japan; T. Morinaka(2), H. Inoue(3), and Y. Saito(4). (2)Tropical Agriculture Research Center, Tsukuba Science City, Yatabe, Ibaraki 305, Japan; (3)Kyushu National Agricultural Experiment Station, Chikugo, Fukuoka 833, Japan; (4) Institute for Plant Virus Research, Tsukuba Science City, Yatabe, Ibaraki 305, Japan. Phytopathology 72:1246-1249. Accepted for publication 9 February 1982. Copyright 1982 The American Phytopathological Society. DOI: 10.1094/Phyto-72-1246.

Double-shelled polyhedral particles about 65 nm in diameter were purified from rice plants infected with rice gall dwarf disease by carbon tetrachloride clarification, polyethylene glycol precipitation, differential centrifugation, and sucrose density-gradient centrifugation. The particles were not disrupted nor were their inner cores exposed when they were treated with chloroform, heat, freezing and thawing, or phosphotungstic acid staining. The purified particles were highly infectious to rice seedlings inoculated via injected insect nymphs. In gel diffusion tests, antiserum against the particle had a titer of 1:2,048 and 1:2 against the homologous antigen and double-stranded ribonucleic acid, respectively. No specific reaction was seen between the new virus and antisera against the rice dwarf and wound tumor viruses that belong to the Phytoreovirus group. These results suggest that the virus is a new member of Phytoreovirus in the plant reovirus group; thus, it was named rice gall dwarf virus.