Chili veinal mottle virus

The Chili veinal mottle virus (ChiVMV) is a significant plant pathogen belonging to the genus Potyvirus within the Potyviridae family. It is recognized as a major limiting factor in the cultivation of Solanaceous crops, causing severe economic losses in tropical and subtropical agriculture by negatively impacting both fruit quality and total yield.

The primary hosts of this virus include chili peppers, sweet peppers, tomatoes, and tobacco. In addition to cultivated plants, the virus utilizes various weed species as alternative hosts, which serve as long-term reservoirs for the pathogen. Infected plants exhibit classic symptoms, such as dark green vein banding, mosaic patterns on the leaves, leaf distortion, and stunted overall growth.

The biology and transmission cycle of ChiVMV are primarily mediated by aphids. As a non-persistently transmitted virus, it is picked up by aphids during brief probes on infected plant tissues and is immediately transmissible to healthy plants. This mechanism makes the virus highly efficient at spreading throughout a field in a very short amount of time, especially when vector populations are high.

Conditions that favor the development of the virus are often linked to seasonal aphid migration and favorable temperatures for plant growth, which also accelerate viral replication. In greenhouse environments, mechanical transmission through pruning, handling, or contact between leaves becomes a secondary but crucial pathway for the disease to spread rapidly across the entire crop.

Management and control strategies focus on preventing infection and limiting the spread:

• Utilizing certified virus-free seeds and seedlings.
• Implementing rigorous aphid control programs using insecticides and biological agents.
• Maintaining field hygiene by removing weeds that act as alternative virus hosts.
• Employing physical barriers like insect-proof netting in greenhouses.
• Promptly rogueing and destroying symptomatic plants to eliminate the source of inoculum.