PCR based detection of betasatellite associated with the begomoviruses using improved universal primers

Betasatellite is mostly associated with monopartite begomovirus and is known to play a key role in expression of severe form of disease of infected dicotyledonous plants. Begomoviruses are transmitted by whitefly, causing most severe diseases in a wide range of crops. Diagnosis of the virus and the associated betasatellites is very important while breeding for resistant varieties. The current study reports an improved set of universal primers viz., CLB36F and CLB37R, with an ability to detect vast range of begomoviruses across the crops. About 31 samples of diverse plant species showing distinct symptoms of begomovirus collected from various geographical regions of India were analyzed to validate the improved universal primer pair. The results showed that the improved universal primer pair could detect the betasatellites of all the samples, whereas, the presently available primer pair viz., beta01/beta02 could detect only five out of fifteen samples. This data can be considered as a clear indication that the improved primer pair reported in the current study is a superior substitution for the detection of diverse betasatellites.