Complete sequence, genotyping and comparative analysis of Pepino mosaic virus discovered isolates from Italy

Pepino mosaic virus (PepMV) causes economic damage to the tomato industry worldwide. In Italy, the virus is endemic in Sicily, an important tomato-production region, and a new outbreak has been recorded in Sardinia after the first PepMV appearance in 2001. Italian PepMV isolates from these two geographically distant regions were molecularly characterized and the complete nucleotide sequence of four isolates was determined by walking primer strategy. The complete nucleotide and deduced amino acid sequences were analyzed and compared with published PepMV sequences. Italian isolates belong to the PepMV-Ch2 strain and had 97.2% to 98.5% identity with those of the reference PepMV-Ch2 deposited in GenBank. The two Sicilian isolates were slightly more variable in the RdRp and TGB1 genes. This study provides new insights into the occurrence and variability of PepMV isolates in Italy.