Diseased plants of oats (Avena sativa L.), barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) and Triticosecale Wittm. ex A. Camus (Triticum L. × Secale L.) were observed in fields in the Vilnius region of Lithuania. Disease symptoms exhibited by the plants included yellowing of leaves, general stunting, sterility and deformation of spikes, dwarfed spikes, and twisted awns, indicating possible infection by phytoplasmas. A phytoplasma-characteristic fragment of 16S rDNA was amplified in nested polymerase chain reactions which were primed by phytoplasma universal primers, confirming phytoplasma infection in the symptomatic plants. RFLP analysis of amplified 16S rDNA indicated that diseased oats were infected by the group 16SrI (aster yellows, AY, group) phytoplasma strain belonging to the subgroup 16SrI-L, and that barley and Triticosecale were infected by strains belonging to the subgroup 16SrI-B. The phytoplasma strains found in oat, barley and Triticosecale were named oat yellows (OatY), barley deformation (BaDef), and Triticosecale stunt (TrSt) phytoplasmas, respectively. This is a first reported characterization of AY phytoplasmas in cereal crops of barley and Triticosecale.

Raktažodžiai: cereal crops, phytoplasma, detection, PCR, RFLP