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Understanding the Molecular Prospective of Plant Virus Transmission via Insect Vectors

Syed Shoaib Mubashir

The best delineated and well-studied plant viral insect vectors include aphids, whiteflies, leafhoppers, plant hoppers and trips. In addition for being the carriers of transmission, insects play a vital role in the infection cycle of many plant viruses. Plant viruses have developed a number of strategies to gain efficient transmission via insect vectors from one individual plant to the next. Most of them have adapted the capsid strategy (Cucumovirus, Crinivirus) and helper component strategies (Caulimovirus, Potyvirus) with variations between different virus genera. Consequently, there is necessity of protein–protein interface between the viruses and their specific vectors to determine acquisition from infected plants and their transmission to healthy hosts. With the development of molecular biology, mutagenesis and reverse genetics have facilitated the accurate identification of viral molecules that regulate the particular interaction with vectors. Therefore, the mechanisms that are responsible for the transmission of various viruses have been deciphered out with this achievement. Further exploration of the interactions responsible for behavioral changes in the insects might uncover the unknown factors that are involved in the process. The apparent specificity of these interactions in circulative and non-circulative plant virus transmission offers opportunities for disruption of vector population and virus transmission control. Keywords: Plant virus transmission; CMV; CaMV; Potyvirus; Insect vectors; Capsid