First report of 16SrII-D phytoplasma associated with eggplant phyllody in China

Abstract

In April 2018, symptoms of phyllody, witches’ broom and little leaf were observed on eggplant on a farm located in Huiyang district, Guangdong province, China. Total DNA was extracted from the leaves of symptomatic plants and subjected to molecular detection using the phytoplasma universal primers R16mF2/mR1, P1/P7 and SecAfor1/SecArev3, which showed PCR products of the expected 1.4 kb, 1.8 kb and 0.8 kb fragments, respectively. The 16S rDNA sequence showed the highest similarity (100%) with ‘Celosia argentea’ phytoplasma strain Ca1 (GenBank accession KX426374), Crotalaria witches’ broom phytoplasma strain CrWB-Hnsy1 (GenBank accession EU650181) and pear decline phytoplasma (Taiwan II) isolate Heping (GenBank accession EF193157) from the 16SrII group. Phylogenetic analyses based on 16S rDNA and secA gene sequences confirmed the closer relationship of the eggplant phyllody phytoplasma (EPP) strain with the 16SrII-D subgroup. Virtual restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) analysis of the 16S rDNA sequence indicated the eggplant phyllody phytoplasma belongs to subgroup D within the 16SrII group (16SrII-D). This is the first report of eggplant phyllody phytoplasma in China.