Developing reverse genetics systems of northern cereal mosaic virus to reveal superinfection exclusion of two cytorhabdoviruses in barley plants

• Published in: Molecular plant pathology Vol. 23; no. 5; pp. 749 - 756
• Main Authors: Fang, Xiao‐Dong, Qiao, Ji‐Hui, Zang, Ying, Gao, Qiang, Xu, Wen‐Ya, Gao, Dong‐Min, Yang, Yi‐Zhou, Xie, Liang, Wang, Ying, Wang, Xian‐Bing
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England John Wiley & Sons, Inc 01.05.2022; John Wiley and Sons Inc
• Subjects: Barley; Cloning; cytorhabdovirus; Edible Grain; Fluorescence; Genes; Genetics; Genomes; Green fluorescent protein; Hordeum; Infections; Insects; Insertion; Kinases; monocot plants; Mosaic Viruses - genetics; NCMV; Plant Diseases; plant negative‐stranded RNA viruses; Plant viruses; Plasmids; Proteins; Red fluorescent protein; Reverse Genetics; reverse genetics systems; Rhabdoviridae; RNA Viruses; Short Communication; Superinfection; superinfection exclusion (SIE); Tobacco; Vectors; Viruses; West Nile virus; reverse genetics systems; NCMV; plant negative-stranded RNA viruses; superinfection exclusion (SIE); monocot plants; cytorhabdovirus
• ISSN: 1464-6722; 1364-3703
• DOI: 10.1111/mpp.13188

Recently, reverse genetics systems of plant negative‐stranded RNA (NSR) viruses have been developed to study virus–host interactions. Nonetheless, genetic rescue of plant NSR viruses in both insect vectors and monocot plants is very limited. Northern cereal mosaic virus (NCMV), a plant cytorhabdovirus, causes severe diseases in cereal plants through transmission by the small brown planthopper (SBPH, Laodelphax striatellus) in a propagative manner. In this study, we first developed a minireplicon system of NCMV in Nicotiana benthamiana plants, and then recovered a recombinant NCMV virus (rNCMV‐RFP), with a red fluorescent protein (RFP) insertion, in SBPHs and barley plants. We further used rNCMV‐RFP and green fluorescent protein (GFP)‐tagged barley yellow striate mosaic virus (rBYSMV‐GFP), a closely related cytorhabdovirus, to study superinfection exclusion, a widely observed phenomenon in dicot plants rarely studied in monocot plants. Interestingly, cellular superinfection exclusion of rBYSMV‐GFP and rNCMV‐RFP was observed in barley leaves. Our results demonstrate that two insect‐transmitted cytorhabdoviruses are enemies rather than friends at the cellular level during coinfections in plants. The recombinant NCMV‐RFP virus was rescued in barley plants and insect vectors to reveal cellular superinfection exclusion of two cytorhabdoviruses, NCMV‐RFP and BYSMV‐GFP, in barley.