Effects of Changing Temperature on Plant Virus Diseases

Abstract

Publisher Summary This chapter summarizes various observations that have been made on the ways in which changing temperature affects the interactions between viruses and their host plants. The chapter emphasizes the need for controlling temperature to obtain consistent results. It is reported that the effects of heat and darkness in increasing susceptibility to infection are additive; plants kept in the dark at 36° reach their maximal susceptibility much sooner than similar plants kept in the dark at 20° and sooner than at 36° in the light. It is demonstrated that the severity of symptoms caused by sugar beet yellows virus in sugar beet by altering the temperature. Physalis floridana plants infected with potato leaf roll Virus lose their symptoms after 20 days at 35°, and the symptoms return in 6 days when the infected plants are returned to 24°. Temperature also greatly influences the movement of the virus in the plant, and sampling the entire plant can often give quite different results from sampling only the inoculated leaves.