Protecting brassicas from disease

 

Scientists have uncovered resistant genes that protect vegetables like broccoli.

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Brassicas vegetables such as broccoli, cabbage and oilseed rape, could now become resistant to a damaging virus, turnip mosaic virus (TuMV), which infects a wide range of cultivated plants but brassicas in particular.
 
Thanks to scientists at Warwick HRI and collaborators, genes that confer resistance to the virus have been identified in the vegetables. Furthermore, the team discovered that the genes provide a resistance that the virus appears not to be able to evolve to overcome.
 
Published recently in the Journal of General Virology, the discovery could have important broader implications for plant breeders and farmers as TuMV is a member of the Potyvirus family – the biggest family of viruses that attack plants – and an important model for understanding other viruses.

When viruses attack

The Warwick HRI scientists examined many of the genes that determine the plant responses to virus attack. One response saw the plant kill off individual cells if they became infected, thereby limiting the viral infection to a very small area of the plant.
 
Another response restricted the virus movement within the plant and stopped its spread from leaf to leaf. The researchers also identified a number of genes that appear to not allow any replication of the virus in plants when it is introduced into the plant.
 
Dr John Walsh, the research group leader, said: “Turnip mosaic virus can cause big economic losses for farmers. We have identified multiple genes that give some varieties of brassica resistance to the virus. By breeding these genes into commercial varieties of the crop using conventional techniques, breeders can protect them from attack. But most importantly, we have identified broad-spectrum resistance provided by a number of genes. This means we potentially have the means to develop brassicas, such as broccoli, that will be robust enough to prevent the virus mutating to overcome the resistance.”
 
The research was funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC).

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