Characterization of Mamestra brassicae Nucleopolyhedrovirus (MabrNPV)-K1 Isolated in Korea

The purpose of this study was to investigate the characteristics of Mamestra brassicae nucleopolyhedrovirus (MabrNPV)-K1 isolated in Korea. Polyhedra of MabrNPV-K1 showed irregular appearance in shape with the average diameter $1.8{\mu}m$. MabrNPV-K1 contained a number of nucleocapsids within a viral envelope embedded in polyhedron. The polyhedrin of MabrNPV-K1 was composed of single polypeptide with a M.W. of approximate 31 kDa which is identical to the commercialized MabrNPV, Mamestrin, as a biological control agent. The nucleotide and amino acid sequences within the coding region of MabrNPV-K1 polyhedrin shared 99.0% similarity with the polyhedrin gene from previous reported MabrNPVs. The median lethal concentrations ($LC_{50}$) of MabrNPV-K1 and Mamestrin to M. brassicae larvae were $3.9{\times}10^3$ PIBs/larva and $6.0{\times}10^4$ PIBs/larva, respectively. Mortality of the MabrNPV-K1 against to the third instars larvae was 15 times higher than that of the Mamestrin. The median lethal times ($LT_{50})$ of MabrNPV-K1 by the concentration of polyhedra were lower ($4.4{\sim}6.1$ days) than those of Mamestrin ($4.1{\sim}8.6$ days). These results suggest that a local strain MabrNPV-K1 has high pathogenicity to M. brassicae and may be useful for the development of biological control agent to control this.