Tomato leaf curl New Delhi virus: an emerging threat to cucurbit crops in China

Cucurbits are economically important vegetable crops widely cultivated around the world. Tomato leaf curl New Delhi virus (ToLCNDV), a bipartite begomovirus belonging to the family Geminiviridae, is mainly transmitted by whitefly Bemisia tabaci. First reported in tomato in India in 1995, ToLCNDV has gradually expanded its host range to cucurbit crops in numerous countries. Over the past few decades, this virus has rapidly spread throughout Asia, Europe and Africa, posing a serious threat to the production of both tomato and cucurbit crops. In China, ToLCNDV was first identified in greenhouse-grown tomatoes in Zhejiang Province in 2021. Since then, its incidence has been continuously rising, and the virus has been increasingly reported to infect a wide range of cucurbit crops. This review summarizes the occurrence, distribution, genomic characteristics, host range, disease symptoms, and transmission modes of ToLCNDV, as well as current integrated management strategies. Future research priorities are also discussed, to provide a theoretical basis for the effective prevention and control of ToLCNDV epidemics in cucurbit crops.