Diagnosis of plant viral pathogens

In the last ten years there has been an explosion in plant virus outbreaks, because of either direct or indirect activities of humans. The ease of transporting plant materials and virus vectors, and collecting relatives of crop plants from the wild, has spread viruses widely throughout the world. The most important step in managing a virus disease is correct identification. Tests for diagnosis should be fast, accurate and inexpensive. Current diagnosis techniques are broadly divided into serological procedures, nucleic acid procedures and combinations of both. This article presents a review of the current and upcoming methods of virus diagnosis in plants.