India has long been at the forefront of agriculture and a big producer of potatoes. Abiotic and biotic variables have a significant impact on agricultural crop productivity. In totality, among all of the losses attributed to agricultural productivity, viruses alone account for a $30 billion loss globally. Plant viruses are highly contagious and their effects on plants are often drastically leading to reduced crop yield and quality. Approximately 40 potato viruses have been identified in various countries with different climates affecting potato productivity.
Potato virus Y (PVY) is one of the most widespread and damaging viruses responsible for potato tuber necrotic ringspot disease (PTNRD) affecting potato cultivation globally.
Dr. Alok Pandya from the Institute of Advanced Research, Gandhinagar, Gujarat with Nidhi Verma (PhD scholar) have developed a device that acts as a promising platform for detecting such viruses at the earliest possible stage, even if symptoms do not manifest, thus saving many acres of land from being infected. They have designed and developed a highly sensitive paper microfluidic-based vertical flow immune device (VFID) for the detection of PVY.
The proposed VFID combines the formation of sandwich immunocomplex with gold nanoparticles to produce visual results in 3−4 minutes. The reliability of VFID was tested with potato leaf samples from potato farm regions. The relative error ranging between a value of 0.2 and 2% indicated the excellent accuracy and performance of the proposed VFID.
The next goal would be to upgrading to a stronger and more diverse version of the device for the detection of multiple viruses at once.
Source: Krishi Jagran. Read the full article here
