Identification of resistances in pumpkin (Cucurbita moschata) accessions against Squash leaf curl Philippines virus in Taiwan
Wen-Shi Tsai: National Chiayi University
<div>The squash crops (<em>Cucurbita</em> spp.) are important vegetables of the world. They have nutrient-dense fruits, while their young shoots and leaves are also often consumed as vegetable. However, leaf curl diseases caused by whitefly-transmitted begomoviruses are a major constraint to squash crop production. The disease symptoms on squash include leaf curling, yellowing, mosaic and plant stunting. In Taiwan, the disease was first observed in 2001 and currently prevalent in squash fields. The causal agent was identified as <em>Squash leaf curl Philippines virus</em> (SqLCPV). The SqLCPV was identified as major virus, distributed widely and revealed high nucleotide sequence identity among isolates (>94%). The pumpkin accession ‘Nigerian Local’ (<em>Cucurbita moschata</em>) with good resistance to two potyviruses, <em>Zucchini yellow mosaic virus</em> and <em>Papaya ringspot virus</em>, was found to be susceptible to SqLCPV. Fortunately, the SqLCPV resistances were screened in two pumpkin accessions by whitefly transmission in an insect-proof cage following the virus detection by PCR. The results of resistance assay in patents, F1 and F2 plants indicated one SqLCPV resistance is a recessive inheritance and the other one is a dominant inheritance. In the future, the candidates related to both of SqLCPV resistances should be identified following development of molecular markers for marker-assisted selection to accelerate the pumpkin breeding with begomovirus-resistance.</div>
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