TY - JOUR

T1 - Beet mosaic virus expression of a betalain transcription factor allows visual virus tracking in Beta vulgaris

AU - Rollwage, Lukas

AU - Maiss, Edgar

AU - Menzel, Wulf

AU - Hossain, Roxana

AU - Varrelmann, Mark

N1 - Funding Information: The authors would like to thank all staff of the Institute of Sugar Beet Research, Leibniz University Hannover and Leibniz Institute DSMZ for their technical support on laboratory work.

PY - 2023/9/15

Y1 - 2023/9/15

N2 - In the field of plant virology, the usage of reverse genetic systems has been reported for multiple purposes. One is understanding virus–host interaction by labelling viral cDNA clones with fluorescent protein genes to allow visual virus tracking throughout a plant, albeit this visualization depends on technical devices. Here we report the first construction of an infectious cDNA full-length clone of beet mosaic virus (BtMV) that can be efficiently used for Agrobacterium-mediated leaf inoculation with high infection rate in Beta vulgaris, being indistinguishable from the natural virus isolate regarding symptom development and vector transmission. Furthermore, the BtMV clone was tagged with the genes for the monomeric red fluorescent protein or the Beta vulgaris BvMYB1 transcription factor, which activates the betalain biosynthesis pathway. The heterologous expression of BvMYB1 results in activation of betalain biosynthesis genes in planta, allowing visualization of the systemic BtMV spread with the naked eye as red pigmentation emerging throughout beet leaves. In the case of BtMV, the BvMYB1 marker system is stable over multiple mechanical host passages, allows qualitative as well as quantitative virus detection and offers an excellent opportunity to label viruses in plants of the order Caryophyllales, allowing an in-depth investigation of virus–host interactions on the whole plant level.

AB - In the field of plant virology, the usage of reverse genetic systems has been reported for multiple purposes. One is understanding virus–host interaction by labelling viral cDNA clones with fluorescent protein genes to allow visual virus tracking throughout a plant, albeit this visualization depends on technical devices. Here we report the first construction of an infectious cDNA full-length clone of beet mosaic virus (BtMV) that can be efficiently used for Agrobacterium-mediated leaf inoculation with high infection rate in Beta vulgaris, being indistinguishable from the natural virus isolate regarding symptom development and vector transmission. Furthermore, the BtMV clone was tagged with the genes for the monomeric red fluorescent protein or the Beta vulgaris BvMYB1 transcription factor, which activates the betalain biosynthesis pathway. The heterologous expression of BvMYB1 results in activation of betalain biosynthesis genes in planta, allowing visualization of the systemic BtMV spread with the naked eye as red pigmentation emerging throughout beet leaves. In the case of BtMV, the BvMYB1 marker system is stable over multiple mechanical host passages, allows qualitative as well as quantitative virus detection and offers an excellent opportunity to label viruses in plants of the order Caryophyllales, allowing an in-depth investigation of virus–host interactions on the whole plant level.

KW - beet mosaic virus

KW - betalain biosynthesis

KW - BvMYB1

KW - Caryophyllales

KW - infectious cDNA clone

KW - virus tracking

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85164478280&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1111/mpp.13372

DO - 10.1111/mpp.13372

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85164478280

VL - 24

SP - 1319

EP - 1329

JO - Molecular plant pathology

JF - Molecular plant pathology

SN - 1464-6722

IS - 10

ER -