B. B. Reddick and L. F. Habera

Department of Entomology and Plant Pathology

The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA.

Capsicum is one of the most diverse vegetable species that is grown today, varying in pod shape and color and pungency levels. It is also considered a high value crop whose use has increased more than 21% since 1994 with more than 7.5 million acres grown worldwide (http://chilepepperinstitute.org/stats.htm). Plant virus diseases can cause losses of up to 90% and are difficult to control. Over 350 lines of Capsicum spp. were tested for resistance to cucumber mosaic virus (CMV), pepper mottle virus (PMV), potato virus Y (PVY), and tobacco etch virus (TEV). Plants were grown in 72 cell float trays in the greenhouse and inoculated at the 4 leaf stage. Plants were evaluated for symptom expression and samples taken for confirmation by enzyme linked immunosorbent assay. Seeds were collected from resistant plants and retested as above. More than 40 lines were resistance to one or more of the viruses in preliminary tests; however, some of these have been previously reported or failed to show resistance when retested. Eighteen lines or cultivars did show operational immunity to one or more viruses when inoculated at the 4 leaf stage (Table 1). Four lines were resistant to all four viruses tested. These pepper lines will need to be evaluated further with more strains of these viruses to see the breath of the resistance. Furthermore, crosses with previously reported resistant lines will need to be made to test if these lines contain new resistance genes or known genes in previously unreported pepper lines.

Table 1.Resistance of Capsicum spp. to cucumber mosaic virus (CMV), pepper mottle virus (PepMV), potato virus Y (PVY) and tobacco etch virus (TEV).

S= susceptible