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Dating the origins of the maize-adapted strain of maize streak virus, MSV-A

¹ South African National Bioinformatics Institute, University of the Western Cape, Private Bag X17, Bellville 7535, South Africa
² Institute of Infectious Disease and Molecular Medicine, University of Cape Town, Observatory, Cape Town, South Africa
³ Centre for High-Performance Computing, Rosebank, Cape Town, South Africa
⁴ Department of Ecology, Evolution and Natural Resources, School of Environmental and Biological Sciences, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ 08901 USA
⁵ Department of Molecular and Cell Biology, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch, Cape Town 7701, South Africa
⁶ Warwick Systems Biology Centre, University of Warwick, Wellesbourne CV35 9EF, UK
⁷ South African Sugarcane Research Institute, Mount Edgecombe, KwaZulu Natal, South Africa
⁸ Crop Protection, ARC-Grain Crops Institute, Potchefstroom 2520, South Africa
⁹ CIRAD, UMR BGPI, TA A54/K, Campus International de Baillarguet, 34398 Montpellier Cedex 5, France
¹⁰ Electron Microscope Unit, University of Cape Town, Private Bag, Rondebosch 7701, South Africa
¹¹ School of Biological Sciences, University of Canterbury, Private Bag 4800, Christchurch, New Zealand

Correspondence
Darren P. Martin
darrin.martin{at}uct.ac.za

Maize streak virus (MSV), which causes maize streak disease (MSD), is one of the most serious biotic threats to African food security. Here, we use whole MSV genomes sampled over 30 years to estimate the dates of key evolutionary events in the 500 year association of MSV and maize. The substitution rates implied by our analyses agree closely with those estimated previously in controlled MSV evolution experiments, and we use them to infer the date when the maize-adapted strain, MSV-A, was generated by recombination between two grass-adapted MSV strains. Our results indicate that this recombination event occurred in the mid-1800s, 20 years before the first credible reports of MSD in South Africa and centuries after the introduction of maize to the continent in the early 1500s. This suggests a causal link between MSV recombination and the emergence of MSV-A as a serious pathogen of maize.

The GenBank/EMBL/DDBJ accession numbers for the genome sequences of the MSV isolates analysed in this study are FJ882089–FJ882124 and FJ882126–FJ882149.

A supplementary table, listing sampling locations, dates and full genome sequence accession numbers of MSV isolates examined in this study, is available with the online version of this paper.