Apricot, sweet cherry, plum and peach are economically important stone fruit crops in Uzbekistan. Plum pox virus (PPV) is the causal agent of sharka disease. This virus is the most destructive viral pathogen of stone fruit trees. No information is available on PPV occurrence in Uzbekistan. In 2019, plum trees exhibiting foliar pale green rings and spots were observed in a 21-year-old orchard of the local cultivar Ispanskiy in the Tashkent region of Uzbekistan.
Scientists at Lomonosov Moscow State University with Chirchik State Pedagogical Institute (Uzbekistan) have collected the symptomatic leaves, have tested samples for PPV and sequenced the isolates.
"The analyses showed that the Uzbek isolates were most closely related to the Kazakh isolate P7R1 from plum (LT600780) with over 99% nucleotide identity. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of PPV from Uzbekistan. This finding expands the geographical distribution of the virus and encourages further studies on PPV prevalence, host range and genetic variability to reduce its impact on the fruit-growing industry," the scientists reported.
Source: Muzaffar Sattorov, Anna A Sheveleva, Vokhid Fayziev, Sergei Chirkov, 'First report of Plum pox virus on plum in Uzbekistan', 2020, Plant Disease.