Small impact of the host plant physiological state on the genome formula of a nanovirus
- 1PHIM, Univ Montpellier, IRD, CIRAD, INRAE, Institut Agro, Montpellier, France
- 2MIVEGEC, CNRS, IRD, Univ Montpellier, Montpellier, France
Abstract
The genome formula refers to the specific and reproducible pattern of relative accumulation of genome segments in within-host populations of viruses with segmented genomes. It has been proposed that the genome formula may have an adaptive function by allowing rapid adaptation of viral genes’ expression, through variation in their relative copy number, in response to a changing environment. Consistently, the faba bean necrotic stunt virus (FBNSV) genome formula has been demonstrated to be strongly dependent on the host genotype, since it changes significantly when the same viral isolate moves from one host species to another. However, the cellular environment of the virus can also be modulated by the growing conditions and/or stresses that impact on plant physiology. In this study, we thus cultivated Vicia faba plants under various biotic and abiotic stressing conditions with the aim of modifying the plant physiology in various and complementary ways and assess its potential impact on the genome formula. Although the plants exhibited phenotypes altered by the tested growing conditions, the total FBNSV accumulation was not impacted by the physiological changes in the plant except by aphid infestation which reduced it. Importantly, in contrast to the drastic change observed when switching hosts, the genome formula showed little or no variation across growing conditions for all the tested stressors. Our results thus indicate that the genome formula is marginally influenced by the physiological state of the host. Author summary: Viruses depend on their host cell to complete their life cycle. However, the cellular environment can fluctuate depending on the host’s physiological state, thereby constraining the virus to adapt the expression of its genes to this new cellular context. Viruses with segmented genomes (monopartite segmented and multipartite viruses) distribute their genetic information across different molecules called genome segments. Within the host, the different genome segments can accumulate at distinct relative frequencies, resulting in a variable number of copies of the genes carried by the respective segments. Therefore, it has been proposed that the fragmentation of the genome across different segments could enable rapid adaptation of viral gene expression to the cellular environment by modulating their copy number. However, under the physiological variations tested here, our study shows that changes in the physiological state of the host plant caused by various stressors have little to no impact on the relative accumulation of the different genome segments of the multipartite FBNSV. This observation contrasts with the extensive changes previously reported following host switch.
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BibTeX
@article{bonnamy2026small,
title = {{Small impact of the host plant physiological state on the genome formula of a nanovirus}},
author = {Mélia Bonnamy and Andy Brousse and Prune Lacôte Popovic and Yannis Michalakis and Stéphane Blanc},
journal = {PLOS Pathogens},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.1371/journal.ppat.1014641},
url = {https://journals.plos.org/plospathogens/article?id=10.1371/journal.ppat.1014641},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Small impact of the host plant physiological state on the genome formula of a nanovirus
AU - Mélia Bonnamy
AU - Andy Brousse
AU - Prune Lacôte Popovic
AU - Yannis Michalakis
AU - Stéphane Blanc
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/21
JO - PLOS Pathogens
DO - 10.1371/journal.ppat.1014641
UR - https://journals.plos.org/plospathogens/article?id=10.1371/journal.ppat.1014641
AB - The genome formula refers to the specific and reproducible pattern of relative accumulation of genome segments in within-host populations of viruses with segmented genomes. It has been proposed that the genome formula may have an adaptive function by allowing rapid adaptation of viral genes’ expression, through variation in their relative copy number, in response to a changing environment. Consistently, the faba bean necrotic stunt virus (FBNSV) genome formula has been demonstrated to be strongly dependent on the host genotype, since it changes significantly when the same viral isolate moves from one host species to another. However, the cellular environment of the virus can also be modulated by the growing conditions and/or stresses that impact on plant physiology. In this study, we thus cultivated Vicia faba plants under various biotic and abiotic stressing conditions with the aim of modifying the plant physiology in various and complementary ways and assess its potential impact on the genome formula. Although the plants exhibited phenotypes altered by the tested growing conditions, the total FBNSV accumulation was not impacted by the physiological changes in the plant except by aphid infestation which reduced it. Importantly, in contrast to the drastic change observed when switching hosts, the genome formula showed little or no variation across growing conditions for all the tested stressors. Our results thus indicate that the genome formula is marginally influenced by the physiological state of the host. Author summary: Viruses depend on their host cell to complete their life cycle. However, the cellular environment can fluctuate depending on the host’s physiological state, thereby constraining the virus to adapt the expression of its genes to this new cellular context. Viruses with segmented genomes (monopartite segmented and multipartite viruses) distribute their genetic information across different molecules called genome segments. Within the host, the different genome segments can accumulate at distinct relative frequencies, resulting in a variable number of copies of the genes carried by the respective segments. Therefore, it has been proposed that the fragmentation of the genome across different segments could enable rapid adaptation of viral gene expression to the cellular environment by modulating their copy number. However, under the physiological variations tested here, our study shows that changes in the physiological state of the host plant caused by various stressors have little to no impact on the relative accumulation of the different genome segments of the multipartite FBNSV. This observation contrasts with the extensive changes previously reported following host switch.
SN - 1553-7374
SN - 1553-7366
ER -