STRAIN VARIABILITY OF PLUM POX VIRUS ISOLATES FROM WESTERN SLOVAKIA

: Leaf tissues of stone fruit trees (plum, apricot, peach and myrobalan) carrying symptoms of plum pox virus (PPV) infection and of peach GF 305 seedlings and Nicotiana benthamiana infected experimentally with PPV were assayed for PPV by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The expected 243 bp PCR products were subjected to restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) analysis with restriction endonucleases AluI and RsaI. All of the PCR products contained the AluI site. The RsaI restriction profiles of the PCR products demonstrated the prevalence of PPV-M subgroup in the tested samples from western Slovakia.