EVERYDAY SCIENCE

Detailed explanation-1: -Plants (crops, medicinal or ornamental), can be infected by viruses. It all may start with an insect bite. The virus only has to reach a single cell to initiate infection. However, as viruses cannot do anything by themselves, they need to hijack the infected cell’s mechanisms to produce copies of themselves.

Detailed explanation-2: -Many diseases caused by common plant viruses reduce the crops of important food plants. In the worst case, potato viruses, among others, can destroy as much as 80% of crops on infected fields. Plants are not entirely defenceless against viruses, although they lack an immune system like the one found in humans.

Detailed explanation-3: -The apical and axillary meristems of plants are the best parts of the plant to make virus-free plants. This is because the rate of division of meristematic cell is higher than the rate of multiplication of virus and viruses are unable to invade newly formed meristematic cells.