[vox_mundi]

First report of a new crop virus in North America

University of Illinois scientists reported in Archives of Virology evidence of the new mastrevirus, tentatively named switchgrass mosaic-associated virus 1 (SgMaV-1). Other members of the mastrevirus genus, a group of DNA viruses, are known to be responsible for decimating yields in staple food crops (including corn, wheat and sugarcane) throughout Africa, Europe, Asia and Australia. It has never been reported in North America.

... "My fear is that this virus is in corn and wheat, and we are not even aware of it," said first author Bright Agindotan, a former postdoctoral researcher at the Energy Biosciences Institute, housed within the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology. "It's like when you are sick and go to the hospital, but the doctors say nothing is wrong with you because they only test for what they know."

[sparky]

.
Early days yet , crops are under incessant attacks by infections , always was , always will be
this particular virus is spread by grasshoppers ,
those are quite common in small plots but pretty much decimated in large agribusiness

Still , it's only a question of time until the large crop growing area are hit with a bad case

there was recently a trully scary outbreak of Ug 99 , of the rust family , the old enemy of Wheat
with reported losses of up to 90% , there was a few brown pants amongst the agronomists
it got , somehow , under control ! more by God's mercy than any human efforts
with the world population straining the means to feed itself
this is just to show we are a couple of growing seasons from the apocalypse ,
always was , always will be

[vox_mundi]

Lack of attention has made stripe rust a threat to the world's wheat, report shows

Inconsistent funding for research into the pests and diseases that threaten key crops leaves global food supplies vulnerable, according to a University of Minnesota-led report published in today's edition of the journal Nature Plants.

For example, while recent attention has focused on the deadly stem rust disease Ug99, a new study led by Jason Beddow, a University of Minnesota applied economist, shows that a potentially greater threat to the world's wheat may come from stripe rust. Stripe rust is a disease that was once a problem limited to cooler, wetter regions, but that has more recently been moving into warmer, drier regions.

Prior to 2000, stripe rust outbreaks were reported in just 11 of the 48 contiguous United States. Since 2000, it has been reported in 26 states. The report further shows that stripe rust now threatens as much as 88 percent of the world's wheat.

“Waiting for new threats to emerge to start up the research and development pipelines could be a costly gamble.”

http://www.nature.com/articles/nplants2015132

[PrestonSturges]

It would probably be pretty easy to develop a plant virus bioweapon, but it would just create refugees that would come'a knocking, so it would not have much strategic value. That is a general problem with trying to weaponize pathogens.

[Outcast_Searcher]

First report of a new crop virus in North America

University of Illinois scientists reported in Archives of Virology evidence of the new mastrevirus, tentatively named switchgrass mosaic-associated virus 1 (SgMaV-1). Other members of the mastrevirus genus, a group of DNA viruses, are known to be responsible for decimating yields in staple food crops (including corn, wheat and sugarcane) throughout Africa, Europe, Asia and Australia. It has never been reported in North America.

So if spreading FUD about Ebola ceases to be fun, start on a new meme.

All doom all the time. Thought of starting a TV channel? With a fragmented marketplace, it might be lucrative.

[vox_mundi]

First report of a new crop virus in North America

University of Illinois scientists reported in Archives of Virology evidence of the new mastrevirus, tentatively named switchgrass mosaic-associated virus 1 (SgMaV-1). Other members of the mastrevirus genus, a group of DNA viruses, are known to be responsible for decimating yields in staple food crops (including corn, wheat and sugarcane) throughout Africa, Europe, Asia and Australia. It has never been reported in North America.

So if spreading FUD about Ebola ceases to be fun, start on a new meme.

All doom all the time. Thought of starting a TV channel? With a fragmented marketplace, it might be lucrative.

Thanks for raising the Noise to Signal ratio OS; you can put your head back up your butt now. It only took you 6 months to reply to a straight science article. We'll wake you if anything important happens.