Detection of Two Viruses in Peanut Seeds by Complementary DNA Hybridization Tests. Mandhana Bijaisoradat, Department of Plant Pathology, University of Georgia, Athens 30602. C. W. Kuhn, Department of Plant Pathology, University of Georgia, Athens 30602. Plant Dis. 72:956-959. Accepted for publication 21 July 1988. Copyright 1988 The American Phytopathological Society. DOI: 10.1094/PD-72-0956.

Dot blot hybridization was applied to the detection of peanut mottle virus (PMV) and peanut stripe virus (PStV) in peanut seeds. Both viruses can be detected readily in 1 mg of infected seed tissue and when extracts from seeds have been diluted 1/62,500 with buffer. One part of an infected seed can be reliably detected when it is mixed with 99 parts of healthy seeds. This sensitivity is 8–10 times greater than that achieved by use of the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. The stringent hybridization conditions of this procedure differentiated PMV and PStV in infected peanut seeds, even though the two viruses share considerable nucleotide sequence homology.