Development of novel sources of resistance to Beet curly top virus through virus-induced gene silencing

Abstract

In recent years curly top disease, caused by Beet curly top virus (BCTV), re-emerged in California, resulting in significant economic losses for sugarbeet production in the San Joaquin Valley. Curly top has affected California agriculture for over a century, and no cost effective control methods have been developed that effectively and reliably prevent losses. During the summer of 2001, Beet curly top virus (BCTV) reemerged as an important, economically damaging pathogen of sugarbeet, tomato, and pepper throughout widespread areas of the western United States. These areas included California, the Snake River Valley of Idaho and the southwestern desert of west Texas and New Mexico. More recently curly top has been problematic in the Rocky Mountain region. The wide host range of BCTV, abundance of the beet leafhopper vector (Circulfer tenellus), and increasing acreage of uncultivated land in some areas is making curly top management increasingly difficult. The present California management strategy focuses on the large-scale use of insecticides to control the leafhopper vector in rangeland, and the use of insecticidal treatments on crops.