The base map of domains was drawn using NCBI Conserved Domains searches (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Structure/cdd/wrpsb.cgi). Rep_2, Plasmid replication protein (pfam01719), Viral_Rep, Putative viral replication protein (pfam02407); Gemini_AL1, Geminivirus Rep catalytic domain (pfam00799); Gemini_AL1_M, Geminivirus rep protein central domain (pfam08283); RNA_helicase, RNA helicase (pfam00910)....

Diseases caused by geminiviruses have long been recognized as a limitation to the cultivation of several important crops, including maize, cassava, bean, squash, cucurbits, and tomato, in tropical and subtropical regions of the world. More recently, geminivirus diseases, particularly those transmitted by whiteflies, have become an even greater threat to agriculture due to the appearance of a ne...

Genomic characterization using nonradioactive probes, polymerase chain reaction with degenerate primers for whitefly transmitted geminiviruses and nucleotide sequencing were used to describe a new bipartite geminivirus, associated with dwarfing and leaf curling of tomatoes and peppers in Jamaica. Partial DNA-A and DNA-B clones were obtained. DNA sequence analysis showed that tomato and pepper s...

Sequence-specific nucleases enable facile editing of higher eukaryotic genomic DNA; however, targeted modification of plant genomes remains challenging due to ineffective methods for delivering reagents for genome engineering to plant cells. Here, we use geminivirus-based replicons for transient expression of sequence-specific nucleases (zinc-finger nucleases, transcription activator–like effec...

infect, among others, wheat (wheat dwarf virus, WDV), maize (maize streak virus, MSV) or different species of grasses. We are interested in identifying regions within the control region of the geminivirus genome which may act as regulatory elements during viral DNA replication and/or transcription. Recently, we have studied the DNA structure of the WDV large intergenic region by 2-dimensional p...

SNF1-related kinases (SnRK1s) play central roles in coordinating energy balance and nutrient metabolism in plants. SNF1 and AMPK, the SnRK1 homologs in budding yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) and mammals, are activated by phosphorylation of conserved threonine residues in their activation loops. Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) GRIK1 and GRIK2, which were first characterized as geminivirus R...

Short-interfering RNAs (siRNAs), the molecular markers of posttranscriptional gene silencing (PTGS), are powerful tools that interfere with gene expression and counter virus infection both in plants and animals. Here, we report the effect of temperature on geminivirus-induced gene silencing by quantifying virus-derived siRNAs and by evaluating their distribution along the virus genome for isola...

The coat protein (CP) gene-containing circular DNA molecule of an isolate of tomato leaf curl geminivirus (ITmLCV; 2749 nt) obtained from southern India, and the CP genes of tomato yellow leaf curl geminivirus isolates from Nigeria and two regions of Saudia Arabia were sequenced. ITmLCV DNA had the same arrangement of ORFs, and the same pattern of repeats in the large intergenic region as is fo...

Sequence-specific nucleases enable facile editing of higher eukaryotic genomic DNA; however, targeted modification of plant genomes remains challenging due to ineffective methods for delivering reagents for genome engineering to plant cells. Here, we use geminivirus-based replicons for transient expression of sequence-specific nucleases (zinc-finger nucleases, transcription activator-like effec...

The geminivirus replication protein AL1 interacts with retinoblastoma-related protein (RBR), a key regulator of the plant division cell cycle, to induce conditions permissive for viral DNA replication. Previous studies of tomato golden mosaic virus (TGMV) AL1 showed that amino acid L148 in the conserved helix 4 motif is critical for RBR binding. In this work, we examined the effect of an L148V ...