Effect of Whitefly Transmitted Geminiviruses on the Physiology of Tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum L.) and Tobacco (Nicotiana benthamiana L.) Plants

Viruses always have profound effect on the growth and development of plants and interact with host defense mechanism and results in altering the physiology of plants. In the present study effect of different whitefly transmitted begomoviruses; (monopartite as well as bipartite) on the contents of soluble sugar and chlorophyll of Lycopersicon esculentum and Nicotiana benthamiana plants were investigated. It was found that the leaf relative water contents (RWC), total soluble sugars (TSS), fresh and dry biomass, photosynthetic pigments level were more in healthy plants as compared to virus infected plants. Plant infected both with Tomato leaf curl new dehli virus and Cotton leaf curl burewalla virus associated with betasatelite showed reduced TSS and leaf relative water contents as compared to healthy plants. Among infectious clones Cotton leaf curl burewalla virus associated with beta satellite (CLCuV+CLCuB), Tomato leaf curl new dehli virus (ToLCNDV) caused more reduction while Malvestrum yellow vein change manga virus (MYVCMV) caused less reduction as compared to above mentioned clones. CLCuV+ CLCuB showed significant effect on Chlorophyll a (9.60, 8.93mg/g), Chlorophyll b (7.2, 5.86 mg/g) and total chlorophyll contents (16.8, 14.8 mg/g) in both plants respectively. While ToLCNDV caused reduction in RWC (80% to 36%) in case of L. esculentum while RWC (75 to 30%) in N. benthamiana. Among L. esculentum TSS was reduced (8.13 to 3.33 mg/g) due to CLCuV+CLCuB infection. In case of N. benthamiana TSS was reduced (9.433 to 2.5 mg/g) due to ToLCNDV. Keywords: Geminivirus, Plant Physiology, TSS, Chlorophyll.