Abstract:
Plant viruses cause a devastating loss in economically important crops throughout the world.
Begomovirus (family Geminiviridae) are circular, single-stranded DNA viruses, transmitted
by a single species of Bemisia tabaci (whitefly) in a persistent circulative manner.
Begomovirus are the most destructive and diverse group of plant DNA viruses that affect a
wide variety of dicotyledonous plants including crops, vegetables, ornamental plants, and
weeds. Weeds and ornamental plants serve as a source of inoculum, alternate hosts, and
recombination sites for the emergence of new virus species/strains. The present study is
aimed at determining the epidemiological analyses of Begomovirus from the South American
region. The complete length nucleotide sequences of 63 Begomoviruses present in South
American regions were retrieved from NCBI. The Begomovirus species were verified
through the species demarcation tool (SDT), using a 91% cut-off value as recommended by
the International Committee for Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV). The phylogenetic analysis
was performed using Mega X Software, and graphs/maps were generated through MS Excel.
A total of sixty-three (63) Begomovirus species (1074 isolates) have been found in the South
American region which are infecting fifty-eight (58) plant species. the plants majorly infected
are Solanum lycopersicum (26 virus species and 432 isolates), Phaseolus vulgaris (7 virus
species and 127 isolates), Macroptilium lathyroides (4 virus species and 52 isolates) and
Phaseolus lunatus (7 species and 70 isolates), Ipomoea batatas (3 virus species and 53
isolates), Euphorbia heterophylla (2 virus species and 57 isolates), Leonurus sibiricus (4
virus species and 51 isolates) and Capsicum annuum (8 virus species and 26 isolates).
Tomato severe rugose virus has dominated in the region (with 234 isolates) followed by Bean
golden mosaic virus which has 154 isolates. Other viruses are Euphorbia yellow mosaic virus
(62 isolates), Sweet potato leaf curl virus (52 isolates), Sida yellow mosaic virus (44 isolates),
Sida micrantha mosaic virus (34 isolates) and Blainvillea yellow spot virus (28 isolates). 924
isolates of 33 virus species have been found in Brazil
