Comparative Studies on Biological and Serological Properties of Turnip Mosaic Virus Isolates

Based on the symptoms on Brassica rapa L. cv. Hakatasuwari, eight isolates of ordinary strain of turnip mosaic virus (TuMV) collected from Japan could be differentiated into three groups, which were respectively designated as OA, OB and OC groups. Biological and serological properties of the virus isolates belonging to these groups were compared from each other. All isolates were almost identical in host range, electrophoretic mobility and in agar gel immunodiffusion test, however, they were much different in some of the other properties such as symptoms on several indicator plants, local lesion size on Nicotiana tabacum L. cv. Samsun, mode of multiplication in B. rapa. physical properties, and serological properties in micro-precipitin test. Some of these properties showed variation correlating with the groups.