FIRST REPORT OF GARLIC COMMON LATENT VIRUS IN GARLIC FROM NIGERIA

Abstract

Garlic (Allium sativum L.) is one of the oldest known horticultural crops of the world. Several viruses belonging to the genera Potyvirus, Carlavirus, and Allexivirus are known to infect garlic and reduce their yield worldwide (Dijk, 1994; Walkey and Antill, 1989). This study was undertaken to investigate the status of viral infection in Nigerian garlic. Ten garlic bulbs collected in March of 2015 from two fields in Kano and Sokoto region of Nigeria were tested by direct antigen coated (DAC)-ELISA with antisera to Garlic common latent virus (GarCLV) (Bioreba, Reinach, Switzerland). All the samples were positive for GarCLV. To confirm the presence of GarCLV, reverse transcription (RT)-PCR was performed using primers published earlier (Majumder and Baranwal, 2014) and total RNA extracted from 100 mg of leaves with the RNeasy Plant Mini kit (Qiagen, GmbH, Hilden, Germany) according to the manufacturer's instructions. Expected amplicons of ca. 450 bp were obtained from all the samples tested. Direct sequencing of the PCR products from one sample produced a 418-bp long nucleotide sequence. It showed 95% identity with a garlic isolate from The Netherlands (GenBank accession No. AB004804). To our knowledge, this is the first report of GarCLV on garlic in Nigeria.