The incidence of cacao swollen shoot disease (CSSD) in cacao ( L.) has increased in West Africa since ~2000. To investigate the genomic and species diversity of the CSSD-badnaviruses infecting cacao in Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana, symptomatic leaves were subjected to high-throughput sequencing. Among the 30 newly determined genomes, three badnaviruses were identified, (CSSTBV), , and (CSSCEV). The phylogenetic trees reconstructed for the reverse transcriptase (RT) and ribonuclease H (RNase H) sequences were incongruent with the complete viral genomes, which had the most robust statistical support. Recombination seems to be involved in the CSSD-badnavirus diversification. The genomic diversity varied among different CSSD-badnaviruses, with CSSTBV showing the lowest nucleotide diversity (π = 0.06236), and CSSCEV exhibiting the greatest variability (π = 0.21911). Evidence of strong purifying selection was found in the coding regions of the CSSTBV isolates.
A herb, identified as a perennial, possesses notable medicinal benefits including anticancer and anti-inflammatory properties but faced challenges when leaf blight disease appeared in Xiangtan City, impacting approximately 22% of affected plants.
The disease symptoms began with water-soaked chlorosis in infected leaves, which progressed to dry yellow shrinkage spreading throughout the plants over a significant planting area of about 30,000 m².
Researchers identified the disease's causal organisms through a series of laboratory techniques, including surface sterilization, culture on specific agar plates, and molecular identification using gene amplification, with results being deposited in GenBank for further study.
Diseases of Theobroma cacao L. (Malvaceae) disrupt cocoa bean supply and economically impact growers. Vascular streak dieback (VSD), caused by Ceratobasidium theobromae, is a new encounter disease of cacao currently contained to southeast Asia and Melanesia.
* CaMMV was detected in commercial cacao trees in Puerto Rico and later in a quarantine greenhouse in Miami, prompting further testing in a USDA repository in Hawai'i to assess the spread of the virus.
* Testing of 230 cacao plants in Hawai'i revealed 26 were positive for CaMMV, with most showing leaf chlorosis, while genetic analysis indicated close similarity to CaMMV strains from Puerto Rico and Florida.
plantations are of significant economic importance worldwide, primarily for chocolate production. During the harvest and processing of cocoa beans, they are subjected to fermentation either by microorganisms present in the environment (spontaneous fermentation) or the addition of starter cultures, with different strains directly contributing distinct flavor and color characteristics to the beans. In addition to fungi and bacteria, viruses are ubiquitous and can affect the quality of the fermentation process by infecting fermenting organisms, destabilizing microbial diversity, and consequently affecting fermentation quality.
Rhodamine-B (RhB) dye in wastewater poses health and environmental risks due to respiratory and eye infections, neurotoxicity, and carcinogenicity, necessitating proper disposal for risk mitigation. This study investigates RhB removal from water using NaOH-modified activated carbon derived from cocoa pod husk (CPHAC). Employing a face-centered central composite design, operational variables were optimized to achieve maximum RhB dye removal efficiency.
