Comparison of an Immunochromatographic Assay Kit with DAS-ELISA for Large-Scale Diagnosis and Molecular Discrimination of Satsuma Dwarf Virus Collected from Citrus Orchards

Satsuma dwarf virus (SDV) seriously damages citrus production by reducing the quality and yield of fruit. To avoid contamination with SDV, mother trees are checked to be SDV-free in advance of nursery tree distribution. In this study, we compared an immunochromatographic assay (ICA) kit with double-antibody sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (DASELISA) for large-scale diagnosis of SDV in orchardgrown trees in Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan. The two methods gave conflicting results for 11 of 1,705 samples, all of which were negative by DAS-ELISA but positive by ICA. The samples scored as positive by either DASELISA or ICA were analyzed by reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction and all were confirmed to be positive. These results validate the use of ICA as a screening method for large-scale diagnosis. Strain discrimination revealed that 16 of 22 isolates belonged to SDV, while citrus mosaic virus (CiMV) infection only and co-infection (SDV and CiMV) were in a minority.