Stolbur and Clover Proliferation Phytoplasma Infections in Tomato from Bingöl province, Turkey

Abstract

Phytoplasma-type symptoms were noted in tomato (Lycopersicum esculentum L.) in Bingöl province of Turkey. The remarkable symptoms include witch’s broom, rosetting, purple curled and crispy leaves, small leaves in the upper branches and excessively elongated calyx. Genomic DNA isolation was performed to identify possible pathogens from the leaves of 11 plants with and without symptom. In the Nested-PCR test performed using universal primer sets, DNA bands of approximately 1200 bp size were obtained in 4 of 11 samples. Randomly chosen two DNA bands primed R16F2n/R16R2 were cloned into an appropriate plasmid vector to further characterizations. The recombinant plasmid DNAs purified were sequenced in both directions. Molecular assays of the 16S rRNA sequence confirmed the existence of the “Canditatus Phytoplasma solani” (16SrXII-A group) (similarity coefficient 1.00) (Accession no: MT279680) and the “Canditatus Phytoplasma trifolii” (16SrVI-A group) (similarity coefficient 1.00) (Accession no: MT279852) in the infected tomato samples. The isolates associated with tomato-phytoplasma were named as ‘Bingöl D11’ and ‘Bingöl D90’ isolates, respectively. The phylogenetic dendrogram created also confirmed where both pathogens belong. This current paper is documented in the first record of “Ca. P. solani” (16SrXII-A) and “Ca. P. trifolii” (16SrVI-A) in naturally diseased tomato in Bingol of Turkey.