Characterizing the genetic diversity of economically important grapevine viruses in Canada

Funding period: 2019-2023
Lead: José Ramon Urbez Torres
Total GRDI funding: $451,192

Only about 13,000 ha of grapevines are cultivated in Canada, however the grape and wine industry contributes over $9 billion to Canada's agriculture and agri-food sector. However, with success come challenges. Grapevines host the largest variety of pathogens than any agricultural crop, which cause important economic losses to the sector. Among all pathogens infecting grapevines, viruses are of significant importance causing negative impacts on vine health and fruit and wine quality. Economic important grapevine virus diseases are present in Canada. The Canadian Grapevine Certification Network (CGCN) was established in January 2017 to develop standards for the first domestic certification program in Canada to provide propagating grapevine material free of major viruses to nurseries and growers. However, the broad genetic variability of major grapevine viruses, coupled with limited sequence information, has raised concerns regarding the accuracy of some of the current standard molecular diagnostic tools for virus detection and identification. Accordingly, there is continuous need for developing/improving large-scale, stringent, cost-effective and multiplexing protocols for detection and proper characterization of economic important viruses, including its genetic variants. The main objectives of this project are thus to characterize the genetic variants of major grapevine viruses in Canada and to use this new information and sequence data to develop, improve and implement better and more accurate detection tools to be used in large-scale field diagnostics in support of both domestic and import/export Canadian clean grape programs.