Mussaenda erythrophylla : A new host of ‘ Candidatus Phytoplasma asteris’ in India

Leaf yellowing symptoms were observed in Mussaenda erythrophylla at Digiyana Park, Jammu during June 2016. Leaf yellowing and flat stem symptoms were also observed on nearby planted Catharanthus roseus and Celosia argentea , respectively. Amplicons of ~ 1.25 kb were consistently amplified in nested PCR assays with DNA extracted from all the symptomatic Mussaenda erythrophylla, Catharanthus roseus and Celosia argentea samples using primer pairs P1/P7 followed by R16F2n/R2. However, no amplifications were achieved with any of the asymptomatic plant samples. Pair wise sequence comparison of the ~ 1.25 kb products of 16S rDNA sequence of M. erythrophylla leaf yellowing, C. roseus leaf yellowing and C. argentea flat stem phytoplasma isolates revealed 99.8% sequence identity with ‘ Candidatus Phytoplasma asteris’ related strains. Phylogeny and virtual RFLP analysis of 16S rDNA sequences confirmed the affiliation of ‘ Ca . P. asteris’ subgroup I-B with all the three symptomatic plant samples. This is the first report of association of ‘ Ca . P. asteris’ subgroup I-B with M . erythrophylla worldwide.