Hybridization for increased yield and nutritional content of snake melon (Cucumis melo L. var. flexuosus)

2010 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 127-131 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sudhakar Pandey ◽  
N. P. S. Dhillon ◽  
A. K. Sureja ◽  
Dilbag Singh ◽  
Ajaz A. Malik
Keyword(s):  
Ascorbic Acid ◽  
Genetic Variation ◽  
Cucumis Melo ◽  
Nutritional Content ◽  
Botanical Variety ◽  
First Report ◽  
Intraspecific Genetic Variation ◽  
Cucumis Melo L

This is the first report on increasing yield and nutritional content of snake melon (Cucumis melo L. var. flexuosus) by exploiting intraspecific genetic variation of genetically diverse melons. Inbred snake melon ‘Punjab Long melon 1’ (PLM1) was hybridized with five genetically diverse inbred melons: KP 7 (var. momordica), AM 72 (var. acidulus), ‘Arya 1’ (var. chate), 04-02 (var. tibish) and ‘Punjab Wanga’ (unknown botanical variety). The parents and hybrids were evaluated at three locations for nine traits. Hybrids PLM1 × 04-02 and PLM1 × ‘Punjab Wanga’ exhibited significant (P0.05) heterosis for the number of marketable fruits per plant, and ascorbic acid and carotenoid contents of marketable fruits.

Genetic variation in Tunisian melon (Cucumis melo L.) germplasm as assessed by morphological traits

2013 ◽  
Vol 60 (5) ◽  
pp. 1621-1628 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rym Trimech ◽  
Yosr Zaouali ◽  
Abdennacer Boulila ◽  
Lotfi Chabchoub ◽  
Ismail Ghezal ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Genetic Variation ◽  
Cucumis Melo ◽  
Morphological Traits ◽  
Cucumis Melo L

scholarly journals First Report of Pythium splendens Associated with Severe Wilt of Muskmelon (Cucumis melo) in Oman

Plant Disease ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 92 (2) ◽  
pp. 313-313 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. M. Al-Sa'di ◽  
M. L. Deadman ◽  
F. A. Al-Said ◽  
I. Khan ◽  
M. Al-Azri ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cucumis Melo ◽  
Morphological Characteristics ◽  
Fruit Production ◽  
Maturation Stage ◽  
Vegetable Crops ◽  
First Report ◽  
Sultan Qaboos University ◽  
Pythium Splendens ◽  
Pathogenicity Tests ◽  
Cucumis Melo L

Muskmelon (Cucumis melo L.) is one of the most important vegetable crops in Oman. In the fall of 2004, sudden wilt was observed in muskmelon grown in a field at Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat. The disease was characterized by rapid collapse of vines and muskmelon plants at the fruit production to maturation stage, associated with brown-to-dark brown rotted primary and secondary roots. The disease resulted in death of more than 85% of muskmelon plants in that field. On potato dextrose agar (PDA), with published methods (1), Pythium spp. were consistently isolated from crowns and roots of plants showing wilt symptoms. Further identification of five isolates of Pythium with sequences of the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) of the ribosomal DNA (1) using ITS1 and ITS4 primers produced a nucleotide sequence 806 bp long, which was identical among all isolates. Comparison with sequences deposited at the National Center for Biotechnology Information revealed 100% nucleotide similarity to a previously published sequence (Accession No. DQ381808) of isolate P091 of P. splendens from cucumber from Oman, for which identification has also been confirmed by morphological characteristics. The sequence of one isolate of P. splendens (P222) was assigned GenBank Accession No. EF546436 and deposited at CBS under Accession No. CBS121855. In pathogenicity tests conducted in a greenhouse, P. splendens induced damping-off symptoms on 7-day-old muskmelon seedlings and also reproduced the same wilt symptoms observed in the field when 2-month-old muskmelon plants were inoculated with 3-day-old P. splendens grown in PDA. To our knowledge, this is the first report of association of P. splendens with wilt of muskmelon in Oman. Reference: (1) A. M. Al-Sa'di et al. Plant Pathol. 56:140, 2007.

scholarly journals First Report of Fusarium incarnatum-equiseti Species Complex Causing Leaf Spot on Rockmelon (Cucumis melo L.) in Malaysia

Plant Disease ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Siti Izera Ismail ◽  
Nur Ainina Noor Asha ◽  
Dzarifah Zulperi
Keyword(s):  
Leaf Spot ◽  
Cucumis Melo ◽  
Species Complex ◽  
Fruit Rot ◽  
Peat Moss ◽  
Distilled Water ◽  
Conidial Suspension ◽  
Isolation Technique ◽  
First Report ◽  
Cucumis Melo L

Rockmelon, (Cucumis melo L.) is an economically important crop cultivated in Malaysia. In October 2019, severe leaf spot symptoms with a disease incidence of 40% were observed on the leaves of rockmelon cv. Golden Champion at Faculty of Agriculture, Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM). Symptoms appeared as brown necrotic spots, 10 to 30 mm in diameter, with spots surrounded by chlorotic halos. Pieces (5 x 5 mm) of diseased tissue were sterilized with 0.5% NaOCl for 1 min, rinsed three times with sterile distilled water, plated onto potato dextrose agar (PDA) and incubated at 25°C for 7 days with a 12-h photoperiod. Nine morphologically similar isolates were obtained by using single spore isolation technique and a representative isolate B was characterized further. Colonies were abundant, whitish aerial mycelium with orange pigmentation. The isolates produced macroconidia with 5 to 6 septa, a tapered with pronounced dorsiventral curvature and measured 25 to 30 μm long x 3 to 5 μm wide. Microconidia produced after 12 days of incubation were single-celled, hyaline, ovoid, nonseptate, and 1.0 to 3.0 × 4.0 to 10.0 µm. Morphological characteristics of the isolates were similar to the taxonomic description of Fusarium equiseti (Leslie and Summerell 2006). Genomic DNA was extracted from fresh mycelium using DNeasy Plant Mini kit (Qiagen, USA). To confirm the identity of the fungus, two sets of primers, ITS4/ITS5 (White et al. 1990) and TEF1-α, EF1-728F/EF1-986R (Carbone and Kohn 1999) were used to amplify complete internal transcribed spacer (ITS) and partial translation elongation factor 1-alpha (TEF1-α) genes, respectively. BLASTn search in the NCBI database using ITS and TEF-1α sequences revealed 99 to 100% similarities with species of both F. incarnatum and F. equiseti. BLAST analysis of these in FUSARIUM-ID database showed 100% and 99% similarity with Fusarium incarnatum-F. equiseti species complex (FIESC) (NRRL34059 [EF-1α] and NRRL43619 [ITS]) respectively (Geiser et al. 2004). The ITS and TEF1-α sequences were deposited in GenBank (MT515832 and MT550682). The isolate was identified as F. equiseti, which belongs to the FIESC based on morphological and molecular characteristics. Pathogenicity was conducted on five healthy leaves of 1-month-old rockmelon cv. Golden Champion grown in 5 plastic pots filled with sterile peat moss. The leaves were surface-sterilized with 70% ethanol and rinsed twice with sterile-distilled water. Then, the leaves were wounded using 34-mm-diameter florist pin frog and inoculated by pipetting 20-μl conidial suspension (1 × 106 conidia/ml) of 7-day-old culture of isolate B onto the wound sites. Control leaves were inoculated with sterile-distilled water only. The inoculated plants were covered with plastic bags for 5 days and maintained in a greenhouse at 25 °C, 90% relative humidity with a photoperiod of 12-h. After 7 days, inoculated leaves developed necrotic lesions similar to the symptoms observed in the field while the control treatment remained asymptomatic. The fungus was reisolated from the infected leaves and was morphologically identical to the original isolate. F. equiseti was previously reported causing fruit rot of watermelon in Georgia (Li and Ji 2015) and China (Li et al. 2018). This pathogen could cause serious damage to established rockmelon as it can spread rapidly in the field. To our knowledge, this is the first report of a member of the Fusarium incarnatum-F.equiseti species complex causing leaf spot on Cucumis melo in Malaysia.

scholarly journals First report of Cucurbit chlorotic yellows virus infecting Cucumis melo (muskmelon and oriental melon) in Korea

Plant Disease ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
In Sook Cho ◽  
Tae-Bok Kim ◽  
Ju-Yeon Yoon ◽  
Bong Nam Chung ◽  
John Hammond ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mosaic Virus ◽  
Cucumis Melo ◽  
Korean Isolate ◽  
Rt Pcr ◽  
Genome Database ◽  
Total Rna ◽  
First Report ◽  
Oriental Melon ◽  
Cucumis Melo L ◽  
Cucurbit Chlorotic Yellows Virus

In December 2018, virus-like symptoms (yellowing, vein clearing) were observed on 2% of muskmelon (Cucumis melo L.) plants in plastic houses on a farm in Gyeongsang province, Korea Total RNA from two symptomatic and two asymptomatic plants was extracted using RNeasy Plant Mini Kit (Qiagen, Germany) for high throughput sequencing (HTS). After pre-processing and Ribo-Zero rRNA removal, a cDNA library was prepared (Illumina TruSeq Stranded Total RNA kit) and sequenced (Illumina NovaSeq 6000 system: Macrogen Inc. Korea). De novo assembly of 88,222,684 HTS reads with Trinity software (r20140717) yielded 146,269 contigs of 201-28,442 bp, which were screened against the NCBI viral genome database by BLASTn. Contigs from cucumber mosaic virus (CMV), melon necrotic spot virus (MNSV), tobacco mosaic virus (TMV) and watermelon mosaic virus (WMV) were identified, all previously reported in Korea. Two contigs (8,539 and 8,040 bp) with 99.9% sequence identity to distinct cucurbit chlorotic yellows virus (CCYV) isolates (JN641883, RNA1, Taiwan; MH819191, RNA2, China) were also identified. The ten sequences most closely related to each RNA of the Korean isolate (≥99% coverage, ≥99.6% nt identity) were from Japan, China, Taiwan, or Israel. CCYV presence was confirmed by reverse transcription-PCR (RT-PCR) using newly designed specific primers, RdRp-F/RdRp-R (5’-ACCGAACACTTGGCTATCCAA-3’/5’-CTTAATGCCGCGTATGAACTCA-3’) span style="font-family:'Times New Roman'; letter-spacing:-0.5pt">and HSP-F/HSP-R (5’-TGAACGACACTGAGTTCATTCCTA-3’/5’-CGCCAAGATCGTACATGAGGAA-3’), against RNA dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp; RNA1) and the heat shock protein 70 homolog (HSP70h; RNA2). Symptomatic samples yielded products of expected sizes (RdRp,450 bp; HSP70h, 510 bp) while asymptomatic samples did not. The amplicons were cloned, and two clones of each were sequenced (BIONEER, Korea; GenBank acc. nos. LC592226 and LC592227) showing 100% and 99.2% nt identity with RdRp and HSP70h genes of Chinese CCYV isolate SD (MH819190 and MH819191, respectively) and other Asian isolates. Primers specific for CMV, WMV, beet pseudo-yellows virus (BPYV) (Okuda et al., 2007), TMV (Kim et al., 2018), MNSV (F/R, 5ʹ-ATCTCGCATTTGGCATTACTC-3ʹ/5ʹ-ATTTGTAGAGATGCCAACGTA-3ʹ), cucurbit yellow stunting disorder virus (CYSDV; Zeng et al., 2011) and cucurbit aphid-borne yellows virus (CABYV; F/R, 5ʹ-CGGTCTATTGTCTGCAGTACCA-3ʹ/5ʹ- GTAGAGGATCTTGAATTGGTCCTCA-3ʹ) were also used. None of these viruses were detected in the symptomatic samples, but both asymptomatic plants were positive for CMV and WMV, and one also for MNSV. In June and September 2020, muskmelon and oriental melon (Cucumis melo L. var. makuwa) plants with yellowing disease (incidence 80-90%) and whiteflies were observed in all investigated plastic houses of one muskmelon and one oriental melon farm in Gyeonggi and Jeolla provinces. Symptomatic samples (14 muskmelon; 6 oriental melon) were collected and RT-PCR tested as above; 19/20 samples were positive for CCYV, but none for the other viruses. The oriental melon sequence (LC592895, LC592230) showed 99.7% and 100% nt identity with the RdRp and HSP70h genes of Chinese isolate SD, respectively. CCYV was first reported in Japan (Okuda et al., 2010), Taiwan, and China (Huang et al., 2010; Gu et al., 2011); to our knowledge, this is the first report of CCYV infecting muskmelon and oriental melon in Korea. Whitefly-transmitted CCYV could present a serious threat of yield losses to cucurbit crops in Korea, requiring control of vector populations to prevent spread of CCYV.

scholarly journals First Report of Black Rot Caused by Phomopsis cucurbitae on Cantaloupe (Cucumis melo) in the Piedmont Region of Northern Italy

Plant Disease ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 95 (10) ◽  
pp. 1317-1317
Author(s):  
A. Garibaldi ◽  
D. Bertetti ◽  
A. Poli ◽  
M. L. Gullino
Keyword(s):  
Cucumis Melo ◽  
Morphological Characteristics ◽  
Its Region ◽  
Northern Italy ◽  
Pathogenicity Test ◽  
First Report ◽  
Sterile Needle ◽  
Pathogenicity Tests ◽  
Cucumis Melo L ◽  
Piedmont Region

Cucumis melo L., belonging to the Cucurbitaceae family, is cultivated on more than 23,000 ha in Italy. Cantaloupe (C. melo L. var. cantalupensis Naudin) is the most popular variety. In summer 2010, a previously unknown rot was observed on fruits produced in Italy and marketed in the Piedmont Region of northern Italy. Early symptoms on fruit consisted of irregular, brown, soft, sunken lesions up to 10 cm in diameter. No surface mold was visible and pycnidia were not present. Internally, the decay is adjacent to the sunken area of the fruit's surface and is soft, water soaked, spongy, with a nearly circular margin, and easily separated from healthy tissues. Fragments (approximately 3 mm3) were taken from the margin of the internal diseased tissues, cultured on potato dextrose agar (PDA), and incubated at 24 ± 1°C, (16 h of light and 8 h of darkness). Fungal colonies initially appeared coarse, at first whitish then buff brown, and produced dark pycnidia 0.5 mm in diameter, which exuded numerous conidia belonging to two types. Type A conidia were hyaline, unicellular, ellipsoidal to fusiform, sometimes slightly constricted in the middle, and measured 5.6 to 10.3 × 1.7 to 2.6 (average 8.0 × 2.1) μm. Type B conidia were hyaline, long, slender, curved, and measured 17.1 to 26.6 × 0.7 to 1.4 (average 22.0 × 1.0) μm. Sclerotia were not produced. The morphological characteristics of the fungus corresponded to those of the genus Phomopsis (1). The internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region of rDNA was amplified using the primers ITS1/ITS4 and sequenced. BLAST analysis of the 543-bp segment showed a 99% similarity with the sequence of a Phomopsis sp. (GenBank Accession No. HM999947). The nucleotide sequence has been assigned the GenBank Accession No. JN032733. Both Phomopsis cucurbitae and P. sclerotioides are pathogenic to Cucurbitaceae, however P. cucurbitae is identifiable by the production of B conidia and the absence of sclerotia. Therefore, P. cucurbitae has been considered the causal agent of the disease. Pathogenicity tests were performed by inoculating three wounded cantaloupe fruits after surface disinfesting in 1% sodium hypochlorite. Six wounds per fruit, 1 cm deep, were made with a sterile needle. Mycelial disks (10 mm in diameter), obtained from PDA cultures of one strain, were placed on each wound. Three control fruits were inoculated with PDA. Fruits were incubated at 16 ± 1°C in the dark. The first symptoms developed 4 days after the artificial inoculation. Two days later, the rot developed at all inoculation points and the pathogen was consistently reisolated. Noninoculated fruit remained healthy. The pathogenicity test was performed twice with similar results. P. cucurbitae has been reported on melon in many countries (2,3). To our knowledge, this is the first report of the disease in Italy. Currently, the relevance of the disease in the country is not yet well known. However, attention must be paid considering that the pathogen can be transmitted through seeds. References: (1) H. L. Barnett and B. B. Hunter. Illustrated Genera of Imperfect Fungi. Burgess Publishing Company, Minneapolis, MN, 1972. (2) L. Beraha and M. J. O'Brien. Phytopathol. Z. 94:199, 1979. (3) E. Punithalingam and P. Holliday. Phomopsis cucurbitae. IMI Descriptions of Fungi and Bacteria. 47, Sheet 469, 1975.

scholarly journals First report of Cucurbit chlorotic yellows virus infecting cantaloupe (Cucumis melo L.) in Texas

Plant Disease ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Regina Nicole Hernandez ◽  
Thomas Isakeit ◽  
Maher Al Rwahnih ◽  
Rick Hernandez ◽  
Olufemi Joseph Alabi
Keyword(s):  
Nucleic Acid ◽  
Coat Protein ◽  
Cucumis Melo ◽  
Composite Sample ◽  
Acid Extraction ◽  
Total Nucleic Acid ◽  
First Report ◽  
Chlorotic Mottle ◽  
Cucumis Melo L ◽  
Cucurbit Chlorotic Yellows Virus

Texas is a major producer of cucurbits such as cantaloupe (Cucumis melo L.), but outbreaks of virus-like diseases often adversely affect yields. Little is known about the identity of the causal or associated viruses. During studies conducted in fall 2020 to explore the virome of cucurbit fields in Texas, a commercial cantaloupe field (~4.1 ha) in Cameron County was observed with virus-like symptoms of interveinal chlorotic mottle and foliar chlorosis and disease incidence was estimated at 100%. Virus-like symptoms including mosaic and leaf curl were also observed in six additional fields across five south and central Texas counties of Atascosa, Hidalgo, Fort Bend, Frio, and Wharton. Forty-six plants, which included 32 symptomatic and 14 non-symptomatic, were sampled from these fields for virus diagnosis and each sample was subjected to total nucleic acid extraction according to Dellaporta et. al. (1983). Initially, equal amounts of nucleic acids from 14 symptomatic plants (two/field) were pooled into one composite sample for preliminary diagnosis by high throughput sequencing (HTS). The cDNA library obtained from the composite sample with a TruSeq Stranded Total RNA with Ribo-Zero Plant Kit (Illumina) was sequenced on the Illumina NextSeq 500 platform, generating ~26.3 M single-end HTS reads (75 nucleotides [nt] each). Analyses of the reads according to Al Rwahnih et al. (2018) revealed several virus-like contigs; among them 23 contigs (206 to 741 nt) shared 98 to 100% nt identities to isolates of cucurbit chlorotic yellows virus (CCYV), genus Crinivirus, family Closteroviridae. Three pairs of CCYV-specific primers were designed from the HTS contigs with primers CCYV-v1330: 5′-AGTCCCTTACCCTGAGATGAA/CCYV-c2369: 5′-CGGAGCATTCGACAACTGAATA targeting ~1 kb fragment of the ORF1a (RNA1), primers CCYV-v4881: 5′-ATAAGGCGGCGACCTAATC/CCYV-c5736: 5′-GATCACTTGACCATCTCCTTCT targeting a ~0.9 kb fragment encompassing the coat protein (CP) cistron of CCYV (RNA2), and primers CCYV-v6362: 5′-CACCTCTTCCAGAACCAGTTAAA/CCYV-c7423: 5′-TGGGAACAACTTATTTCTCCTAGC targeting ~1 kb spanning partial minor coat protein (CPm) and p26 sequences (RNA2). Total nucleic acid extracts of each of the 46 samples from the seven fields were tested by two-step reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction using all three CCYV-specific primer pairs and they yielded amplicons of expected sizes from all five symptomatic cantaloupe samples from the Cameron County field and one additional symptomatic butternut squash sample from a field in Hidalgo County. The DNA bands from three randomly chosen cantaloupe samples were cloned and sequenced as previously described (Oke et al. 2020). In pairwise comparisons, the obtained 1,040 nt ORF1a (MW584332-334), 753 nt complete CP (MW584335-337), and 1,062 nt CPm/p26 (MW584338-340) gene specific sequences from the three samples shared 100% nt identity with each other, and 99-100% nt identities with corresponding RNA1 (AB523788) and RNA2 (AB523788) sequences of the exemplar isolate of CCYV. This is the first report of CCYV in Texas, thus expanding the current geographical range of the virus in the U.S. that includes California (Wintermantel et al. 2019) and Georgia (Kavalappara et al. 2021). The abundance of whiteflies of the Bemisia tabaci species complex in south Texas and other major U.S. cucurbit production areas presents additional challenges to virus disease management.

scholarly journals First Report of Myrothecium verrucaria from Muskmelon Seeds

Plant Disease ◽  
1999 ◽  
Vol 83 (6) ◽  
pp. 589-589 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Belisario ◽  
E. Forti ◽  
L. Corazza ◽  
H. A. van Kesteren
Keyword(s):  
Root Rot ◽  
Cucumis Melo ◽  
Potato Dextrose Agar ◽  
Main Root ◽  
Differential Host ◽  
First Report ◽  
Myrothecium Verrucaria ◽  
Petri Dishes ◽  
Melon Seeds ◽  
Cucumis Melo L

Myrothecium verrucaria (Albertini & Schwein.) Ditmar:Fr. was isolated from muskmelon (Cucumis melo L.) seeds of Charentais-T, a culti var used as a differential host with no resistance to Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. melonis races. A white floccose mycelial mat developed on melon seeds during incubation on moist blotters. Mycelia were mass transferred from melon seeds onto potato dextrose agar (PDA) medium. At 25°C in the dark, a mycelial mat with characteristic annelations of greenish-black sporodochia, without setae, was produced. Conidia (2 to 3 × 6 to 10 μm) were lemon shaped, with a typical conical mucous appendage at one end, which was visible with Loeffer's flagella stain (1). Based on these characteristics, the fungus was identified as M. verrucaria. For pathogenicity studies, surface sterilized seeds of C. melo cv. Charentais-T were coated with M. verrucaria conidia by gently rubbing the seeds on sporodochia produced on 15-day-old cultures on PDA. Once coated, seeds were plated onto water agar and on sterile moist blotters in 9-cm-diameter petri dishes. Plates were incubated at 28°C in the dark. Five seeds per plate and three plates per experiment were used. Experiments were replicated three times. Control seeds were plated without coating. After 7 days, on water agar, 90% of melon seeds failed to germinate while the remaining 10% produced young seedlings that died from root rot and necrotic lesions on the hypocotyl. After 12 days on moist blotters, 100% of the melon seedlings died, showing necrotic lesions on the hypocotyl and on the main root. The pathogen was reisolated from symptomatic melon seedlings. All control seeds germinated and grew into healthy seedlings. M. verrucaria, known to be a seed-borne pathogen, has been isolated from soil and plants worldwide (2). This is the first report of M. verrucaria pathogen on muskmelon. This fungus is not a serious concern when seeds are dressed with fungicides. References: (1) K. V. A. Thompson and S. C. Simmens. Nature. 193:196, 1962. (2) S.-M. Yang and S. C. Jong. Plant Dis. 79:994, 1995.

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