Incidence of aphid-transmitted strawberry viruses in Korea and phylogenetic analysis of Korean isolates of strawberry mottle virus

Among more than 30 viruses infecting strawberry, aphid-transmitted viruses including Strawberry mild yellow edge virus (SMYEV), Strawberry mottle virus (SMoV), Strawberry crinkle virus (SCV), and Strawberry vein banding virus (SVBV) have been considered as the most economically important viruses of strawberry in the world. To determine the incidence of these four viruses in major Korean strawberry cultivars, field surveys were conducted in major production areas during 2018–2019. In our surveys, SMYEV and SMoV were detected with low infection rates of 0.7% and 1.3%, respectively, whereas SCV and SVBV were not detected. No obvious symptoms were observed in the strawberry plants infected by SMYEV or SMoV. Since no sequences of SMoV Korean isolates have been reported, we initially determined nucleotide sequence of the 3' untranslated region (UTR) of seven SMoV isolates obtained during the surveys. The 3' UTR sequences (782 nt) of seven Korean isolates were phylogenetically compared with those of the previously reported SMoV isolates. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that most Korean isolates are closely related to Canadian isolates and only little evolutionary differentiation occurred among the Koreans isolates. This might be due to the low incidence of SMoV in strawberry in Korea.