Join us in making a difference—become a junior board member and help shape the future of IS-MPMI! Do you want to contribute your voice, ideas, and leadership to IS-MPMI? Nominations for two junior board member seats on the IS-MPMI Board of Directors are being accepted through March 21, 2025.
IS-MPMI is pleased to announce this year’s awards recognizing the outstanding service, scientific innovations, and significant accomplishments of our members. Congratulations to Roger Innes on receiving the Outstanding Achievement Award and Sebastian Eves-van den Akker on receiving the Early Career Achievement Award. Awardees will be recognized and celebrated at the IS-MPMI 2025 Congress.
This award recognizes an investigator who has a high international reputation as a research leader for groundbreaking and original research in the area of molecular plant-microbe interactions. The award also recognizes their strong commitment to one or more activities that advance the IS-MPMI field, including teaching, mentoring, educational outreach, international collaborations, service to the community, and/or advancing diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging.
Distinguished Professor Roger Innes
Indiana University
Roger Innes holds the Class of 1954 Professorship in Biology at Indiana University-Bloomington. He received his Ph.D. degree in molecular, cellular and developmental biology at the University of Colorado-Boulder, and completed post-doctoral research at the University of California-Berkeley, where he helped develop Arabidopsis as a model system for studying molecular plant-microbe interactions. He is an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Academy of Microbiology and is the immediate past president of the International Society of Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions. He also served as president of the North American Arabidopsis Steering Committee (NAASC). His current research focuses on molecular mechanisms underlying the plant immune system and development of novel strategies for engineering disease-resistant crops. Over the course of his career, Dr. Innes has contributed to several seminal discoveries in plant-microbe interactions. These include the discovery that legumes secrete isoflavanoids from their roots to induce expression of nodulation genes in Rhizobium; the identification of the first avirulence proteins in Pseudomonas syringae that are recognized by Arabidopsis (AvrRpt2, AvrB and AvrPphB); the identification and cloning of the Arabidopsis NLR genes RPM1 and RPS5, which were among the first NLR genes cloned from plants; and development of the “guard model” for NLR protein function, whereby NLR proteins sense modifications of host proteins targeted by pathogen effectors. Most recently, his group has shown that plants secrete extracellular vesicles and RNA in response to pathogen infection, with the surprising discovery that plant leaves are coated by RNA, which is likely to impact the microbes that colonize leaf surfaces.
This award recognizes an outstanding investigator who is known internationally as an emerging research leader in the area of molecular plant-microbe interactions.
Professor Sebastian Eves-van den Akker
University of Cambridge
Sebastian Eves-van den Akker received his B.S. degree in biology (2007–2010) from the University of Leeds, and his Ph.D. degree in plant pathology (2010–2014) from the University of Leeds (with Prof. Peter Urwin) and the James Hutton Institute (with Prof. John Jones). In late 2014, Sebastian was awarded an Anniversary Future Leaders Fellowship from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council and moved to the University of Dundee (with Prof. Paul Birch) and the John Innes Centre (with Prof. Mark Banfield). In 2018, he moved to the University of Cambridge to establish the Plant-Parasite Interactions group in the Department of Plant Sciences and was made a Fellow of King’s College Cambridge. In 2024 he was made Professor of Biotic Interactions. From undergraduate to professor, Sebastian has worked on one problem: plant-parasitic nematodes. Today, the lab tends to look at questions from a genetic perspective, investigating the genes that control the dialogue between the two kingdoms. The sustaining interest has been that the outcome of this communication dictates plant organ development, animal sex determination, and ultimately human food insecurity.
We heard you—many of you needed a little more time, and we’re making it happen. This is your final chance to submit your abstract for oral presentation and be part of the 2025 IS-MPMI Congress in Cologne, Germany, July 13–17.
Don’t wait—take advantage of this extra time and submit your abstract today!
Register now for the 2025 IS-MPMI Congress and save! Join over 1,000 global experts for groundbreaking sessions, dynamic posters, and unmatched networking. Early bird rates end April 30—secure your spot today!
Date: July 13, 2025
Duration: 12:30-2:45 p.m.
Mentorship provides enormous support and guidance in building successful careers for mentees. The MPMI Assistant Feature Editors (AFEs) aim to provide a platform for early career attendees to learn and understand the effect of mentorship on career development. The Building Careers in Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions Through Effective Mentoring satellite meeting is intended to serve as a space to explore the influence of mentorship in career growth. Participants will hear talks from academic and industry professionals, sharing the role of mentors in shaping their careers, how to approach a potential mentor, and different mentoring styles. The talks will be followed by small group discussions, including one mentor, that delve into the specifics of mentorship and fostering personal growth and career advancement. The workshop offers a unique opportunity for both mentors and mentees to network and build meaningful connections.
We acknowledge the support of organizations such as the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, Terrana Biosciences, and Corteva AgriscienceTM. The workshop is offered at an affordable rate of $10. Registration is now open, and spots are limited. More details will be shared following registration.
For more details, please feel free to reach out to the organizing committee: Ruby Tiwari (AFE, MPMI Journal), Meenu Singla-Rastogi (AFE, MPMI Journal), Jawahar Singh (AFE, MPMI Journal), Ved Prakash (AFE, MPMI Journal), Ashley Nelson (graduate student, North Dakota State University), Namrata Jaiswal (research molecular biologist, USDA ARS, Purdue University).
Bhuwan Abbot
Ademola Adewuyi
Priscilla Tijesuni Adisa
Durga Venkata Ravi Teja Amulothu
Chunpeng An
Victoria Armer
Claude Becker
Josh William Bennett
Miroslav Berka
Veronika Berková
Anika Damm
Axelle Eliane Deroubaix
Ruoqi Dou
Nawaraj Dulal
Denise Caldwell
Arianna Capparotto
Jijie Chai
Balakumaran Chandrasekar
Yi-Chen Chang
Sydney Chen
Yao Chen
Yi-Feng Chen
Paula Collado Cordon
Marina Soneghett Cotta
Ishani Shankar Das
Buddhika Amarasinghe Dahanayaka
Frederickson Entila
Tzion Fahima
Liz Florez
Patricia Gallardo
Man Gao
Dablieny Hellen Garcia Souza
Lorenzo Gastelum Mena
Susana Giraldo Ramirez
Libia Fernanda Gómez-Trejo
Caroline Gutjahr
Kira Gysel
Manisha Haag
Max Hayhurst
Sofia Hernandez Luelmo
Johannes Herpell
Mariana Herrera Corzo
Muhammad Taufiq Hidayat
Karen Vanesa Hobecker
Fernando Matias Hurtado, Sr.
Seonghan Jang
Zhihao Jiang
Linnan Jie
Christian-Frederic Kaiser
Janani Kalaivani Sivakumar
Shubhangi Kalla
Amandeep Kaur
Abul Khayer
RJong Hum Kim
Gregory Knight
Stanislav Kopriva
Darius Kosmützky
Christine Kraus
Jenna Krumbach
Tyler Marzucco Lee
Volker Lipka
Yinuo Liu
Yujing Liu
Zhaohui Liu
Juan Carlos Lopez-Agudelo
Shuyi Luo
Joy Lyu
Riikka Mäkilä
Christian Mandelli
Clemence Marchal
Ann-Kathrin Maurer
David Colin McLean
Athira Menon
Fantin Mesny
Federico Gabriel Mirkin
Ishani Mondal
Arijit Mukherjee
Pratchaya Pramoj Na Ayutthaya
Daniela Negrete-Moreno
Bruno Ngou
Dalton Ngu
Ha Truong Nguyen
Bridget O’Banion
Erika Ono
Oloyede Joshua Oyekanmi
Ceren Özdemir
Shaojun Pan
Sooyeon Park
Imani Pascoe
Micaela Peppino
Leon Pierdzig
Delphine Maya Pott
Ram Sevak Raja Kumar
Chloe Ramirez
Lindsey E. Reid
Julia Retzlaff
Clemence Andrea Rodney
Sophie Charlotte Sent
Raphael Schaal
Ina Schlathoelter
Monja Schmid
Mariana Schuster
Kyungyong Seong
Anjana Sharma
Chaonan Shi
Wei Shi
Smita Of Shrestha
Yang Si
Abram William Smith
Mitchell Sorbello
Zarah Sorger
Thomas Spallek
Marta Suarez-Fernandez
Oliver Sulkowski
Huang Tan
Chika Tateda
Rachel Tavares
Corinna Thurow
Olivia Tjahjono
Yerisf Carla Torres Ascurra
Natsuki Tsuchida
Colin Turnbull
Kerstin Unger
Andrea Vadillo Dieguez
Katarina Petra Van Midden
Renzo Villena
Liyuan Wang
Qi Wang
Shaogan Wang
Wei Wang
Zonghua Wang
Hua Wei
Siyuan Wei
Katherine Wheeler
Sarah Wolf
Hyeonu Yang
Heejin Yoo
Yanrong You
Ziyue Zeng
Leonie Margarete Zott
All 2025 IS-MPMI Congress attendees qualify for a $500 discount off their article processing charge when they submit a manuscript to MPMI. Stop by the journal’s booth at the meeting to receive your promotional code.
The focus issue Fine Grain: Molecular, Cellular and Genomic Details of Cereal Crop Diseases is coming to MPMI this spring! Get a sneak peek at the focus issue with articles now available in Just Published:
Daniil M. Prigozhin, Chandler A. Sutherland, Sanjay Rangavajjhala, and Ksenia V. Krasileva
Haider Ali, Megan C. McDonald, and Graeme J. Kettles
Eliza P. I. Loo, Boris Szurek, Yugander Arra, Melissa Stiebner, Marcel Buchholzer, B. N. Devanna, Casiana M. Vera Cruz, and Wolf B. Frommer
The Molecular Dialogue Between Zymoseptoria tritici and Wheat
Lukas Meile, Cristian Carrasco-López, Cécile Lorrain, Gert H. J. Kema, Cyrille Saintenac, and Andrea Sánchez-Vallet
Chi Hzeng Wong, Jeffrey Alexander, and Satyanarayana Tatineni
Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions (MPMI) is looking for creative, innovative communicators who eagerly want to volunteer their time to engage with both the scientific and nonscientific communities in accessible ways. As an assistant feature editor, you’ll be a part of a journal editorial team, see the inner workings of the MPMI journal, interact with the greater molecular plant-microbe interactions scientific community, and be directly involved in science communication projects, including writing commentaries, press releases, and author spotlights. Learn more about the opportunity and how to apply.
All 2025 IS-MPMI Congress attendees qualify for a $500 discount off their article processing charge when they submit a manuscript to MPMI. Stop by the journal’s booth at the meeting to receive your promotional code.