The greatest current threat to cassava in sub-Saharan Africa, is the continued expansion of
plant virus pandemics being driven by super-abundant populations of the whitefly vector,
Bemisia tabaci. To track the association of putatively genetically distinct populations of B.
tabaci with pandemics of cassava mosaic disease (CMD) and cassava brown streak disease
(CBSD), a comprehensive region-wide analysis examined the phylogenetic relationships
and population genetics of 642 B. tabaci adults sampled from cassava in six countries of …