Project title
The construction of an infectious clone of grapevine virus A

Project leader
Burger, J T

Institution
University of Stellenbosch. Department of Genetics

Project description
Shiraz decline is an emerging disease of grapevine in the Western Cape with very distinctive symptoms, and a crippling effect in vineyards. Infected vines deteriorate relatively fast and normally die within five years. The etiology of the disease is largely unknown, but is believed to be of multiple viral origin with Grapevine virus A (GVA) consistently associated with the disease (pers. comm. D. Goszczynski). The aim of the project is to investigate GVA?s role in this interaction by creating a tool to study pathogen-host interactions on a molecular level. We aim to construct a full-length infectious cDNA clone of the virus and to ultimately develop a transient expression vector for grapevine to assist in elucidating the etiology of this disease, and possibly obtaining resistance to Shiraz disease.

Our objective for the first year is to construct an infectious clone of a local isolate of GVA. We plan to isolate and clone contiguous fragments of the viral genome by RT-PCR and to assemble these into a complete and infectious clone.

Poster(s)
1.  Van Eeden, C and Burger, J T. 2002. A study towards the introduction of multiple virus resistance in grapevine through PTGS. 40th South African Society for Plant Pathology Congress, 20-23 January, Dikhololo, South Africa.
2. Van Eeden, C and Burger, J T. 2002. The introduction of multiple virus resistance in grapevines through virus-induced gene silencing. Cape Biotech Conference, Somerset West.
3.  Van Eeden, C, Freeborough, M J and Burger, J T. 2004. The introduction of multiple virus resistance in grapevines using PTGS. 18th Congress of the South African Genetics Society, 4-7 April, Stellenbosch, South Africa.
4. Burger, J T and Engelbrecht, M. 2004. The construction of a tandem silencing vector for grapevine. 18th Congress of the South African Genetics Society, 4-7 April, Stellenbosch, South Africa.
5. Du Preez, J, Freeborough, M-J and Burger, J T. 2005. Exploiting the GVA genome as a Somatic Expression Vector in grapevine. International Grape Genomics Symposium, St Louis, MO, USA.

Presentation(s)
1. Du Preez, J and Burger, J T. 2002. The construction of an infectious clone of grapevine virus A. National Congress of the South African Society for Enology and Viticulture, November, Somerset West, South Africa.
2. Burger, J T, Engelbrecht, M and Van Eeden, C. 2003. The construction of gene silencing vectors for the introduction of multiple virus resistance in grapevines. 14th Meeting of the International Council for the Study of Virus-like Diseases of Grapevine, 12-17 September, Locorotondo, (Bari), Italy.
3. Du Preez, J, Freeborough, M-J and Burger, J T. 2005. The construction of an RNA virus-based expression vector for grapevines. Congress of the South African Society of Enology and Viticulture, Somerset West. South Africa.
4. Du Preez, J, Freeborough, M-J and Burger, J T. 2006. The construction of an RNA virus-based expression vector for grapevine. Plant and Animal Genome XIV Conference, San Diego, Ca, USA.

Final report
http://www.sawislibrary.co.za/dbtextimages/FinalReport101.pdf

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