Journal of Aquaculture Research & Development

Abstract

Incidence of White Spot Syndrome Virus (Wssv) in Indian Farmed Frozen Shrimp Products and Testing for Viability Through Bio-Inoculation Studies

Devivaraprasad Reddy A ,Jeyasekaran G *,Jeya Shakila R

The incidence of white spot syndrome virus (WSSV) in the Indian farmed frozen shrimp products viz., whole, headless (HL) and peeled and undeveined (PUD) by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was studied. The viability of WSSV in farmed frozen shrimps was investigated by conducting bio-inoculation studies. The products were screened for WSSV by both the single step (for the primer sets 1s5 & 1a16 and IK1 & IK2) and nested PCR (for the primers IK1 & IK2 - IK3 & IK4). Single step PCR detected WSSV in 18% of samples, while the nested PCR detected WSSV in 73% of samples. The frozen material, which gave positive results for WSSV by PCR, was further confirmed for the viability of WSSV by the bio-inoculation studies. Mortality (100%) was observed within the 45 h of intra-muscular post injection (P.I) into the healthy wild live WSSV-free shrimps (Penaeus monodon). These results show that the WSSV survived the freezing process and the cold storage and could cause infection in native shrimp farms if such products are reprocessed in the importing countries.