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New threat to tomato crops uncovered in the Indian Ocean

Scientists have discovered and fully sequenced the genome of a new virus affecting tomato plants on Reunion Island, located in the Western Indian Ocean. Named Tomato yellow leaf curl Reunion virus (TYLCREV), this is the first time the virus has been described, according to a report published last month in the journal ‘Archives of Virology’. TYLCREV is classified as a monopartite begomovirus and is closely related to the well-known Tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TYLCV). One of the key findings, according to the report, is that TYLCREV’s genome shows evidence of interspecies recombination: about 52 per cent of its sequence is closely related to TYLCV, while the remaining 48 per cent resembles begomoviruses previously identified in Madagascar. READ MORE.