A novel mechanism of pararetroviruses transmission

Numerous endogenous pararetroviruses (EPRVs) are found to be integrated in variable copy numbers into the genome of various crops such as banana, petunia and tobacco. Although EPRVs might in some cases be simply neutral components of plant genomes, in other instances they can be infectious, express viral particles and cause severe diseases in plants. Recent experimental evidences show that EPRVs are widespread in the genome of a large number of crops and might be highly detrimental to existing and future crop improvement-oriented breeding programmes, in vitro mass propagation of vegetative crops and germplasm conservation. Our project aims at studying the biodiversity and roles of EPRVs in plant germplasms, their interactions with plant and viral genomes, the associated risks in pathogenesis, and their potential to confer viral resistance in order to develop appropriate risk assessment strategies for the control of potentially pathogenic EPRV sequences in crops relevant to European agriculture.