serological and molecular detection of insv and introduction of some insv ornamental host plants from five provinces in iran

impatiens necrotic spot virus (insv) infects ornamental plants worldwide. it has been reported from almost every ornamental screenhouse in tehran province. insv symptoms include necrotic leaf spot, chlorosis and stunting. heavy losses have been reported from insv in plants such as zinnia elegans, ficus benjamina, viola spp., saintpaulia ioantha, althea spp., cheiranthus cheiri, pelargoniumxhortorum, dahlia spp. and gazania spp., reducing quality and quantity of infected plants. in this research a total number of 581 ornamental samples of 58 different plant species with symptoms similar to those of insv infection were collected in lahijan, tonkabone, mahallat, varamin and dezful. the results indicated an average of 20.13% virus incidence in the collected samples in 4 provinces. insv infection was recorded to be 28% in mahallat, 24.5% in tehran, 22.1% in mazandaran and 16.4% in guilan. no record of insv infection was obtained from khuzistan (dezful) ornamental samples. of the total of 58 ornamental species tested 33 species were recorded positive for insv. most elisa positive samples were rechecked by rt-pcr using a set of specific primers directed to the n-gene and designed to amplify 777 bp product as shown by agarose gel electrophoresis. the results of serological and molecular tests showed infection of the following plants: alestreomeria spp. (markazi), erica spp. (mazandaran and guilan), spathiphylum spp. (mazandaran and guilan), zinnia elegans (tehran), anthurium spp.(guilan and mazandaran), ficus benjamina (markazi and mazandaran), viola spp. (tehran), saintpaulia ioantha (markazi and tehran), scindapsus aureus (guilan), pilea cadieri (markazi), zingiber spp. (mazandaran), impatiens spp. (tehran and mazandaran), althea spp. (mazandaran, guilan and markazi), chrysanthemum spp. (guilan and mazandaran), dracaena fragrance (guilan), diffenbachia amoena (mazandaran), rosa spp. (mazandaran, guilan, markazi and tehran), salvia splendens (mazandaran and markazi), cycas spp. (mazandaran), cissus spp. (mazandaran), syngonium podophyllum (mazandaran), cheiranthus cheiri (markazi), pelargonium×hortorum (tehran and markazi), ficus elastica (markazi), philodendron spp. (markazi and mazandaran), bougainvillea spp. (tehran), codiaeum variegtum (tehran), dahlia spp. (markazi and tehran), gazania spp. (markazi and tehran), gladiolus spp. (tehran), zinnia elegans (markazi and tehran),dianthus spp. (markazi and tehran) and calendula spp. (markazi and tehran) are as insv ornamental hosts from iran. because of difficulties with direct rna extraction from leaf tissues, ficus benjamina, saintpaulia ioantha, gladiolus spp., cycas spp., cissus spp., ficus elastica, rosa spp., bougainvillea spp. and dianthus spp. were not rechecked by rt-pcr in this study.