Molecular assessment of Chemotherapy and meristem culture efficiency to production of seven cultivars of virus free pear

This study was aimed to production of healthy primary pear plants for propagation and establishment of a high health maternal orchard in 2014 at Agriculture Biotechnology Research Institute of Iran (ABRII). The experiments were conducted by evaluate the effectiveness of the chemotherapy treatments (Ribavirin (0, 20, 40 and 80 mg/l) and the sizes of apical meristems culturing (less than 0.2 mm, between 0.2 to 0.7 mm and larger than 0.7 mm) on virus eradicate (ACLSV, ASPV, ASGV) from seven pear cultivars ("Abate Fetal", "Beiruti", "Coscia", "Dargazi", "Louise Bonne", "Mellina" and "Spadona"). At first maternal samples were tested for ACLSV, ASGV and ASPV by RT-PCR and all explants had been infected with all three viruses except Fettel and Beirut that were free from ASPV. We performed the chemotherapy treatments then meristems were cultured and grown in vitro. Regenerated shoots from meristem were tested by RT-PCR for all three viruses. The results showed that increasing the concentration of ribavirin and reducing the size of cultivated meristem was effective on all the three viruses’ elimination from explants. Also the responses of studied cultivars and virus varieties were different in treatments of this research. Samples that were diagnosed virus free by using RT-PCR, were proliferated, rooted and transferred into the pots to be used for later propagation and establishment of maternal orchard.