Application of qPCR for plum pox virus detection during cryotherapy

Abstract

For the purpose of removing viruses from infected plant material, cryotherapy is a novel application of the plant cryopreservation technique. The use of various cryotherapy procedures and treatments necessitates the examination of cryo-treated material for the presence of the targeted pathogen in order to gauge the effectiveness of the therapy. In our study, we evaluated the efficiency of reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and qPCR (quantitative PCR) methods for the detection of plum pox virus (PPV) in cryotreated material of plums ‘Belošljiva’ and ‘Crvena Ranka’. A qRCR assay showed higher sensitivity in comparison to conventional RT-PCR.