IS-MPMI members, including President Sheng Yang He, Immediate Past President Sophien Kamoun, along with Jeff Dangl, Jonathan Jones, and Xinnian Dong, were recently interviewed on plant defense in a cover story for The Scientist.
“Holding Their Ground,” gives a perspective on the ways scientists who specialize in plants are helping hold up a strong defense to pathogens. More and more research is being done on plant immunity, and new findings could present plant breeders with ways to compete with these harmful pathogens.
As with most things, the challenge will continue to be the overcoming of continuous adaptation to ever-changing plant and pathogen evolution.
Read what our members have to say about protecting the global food supply through enhancing plants’ pathogen resistance.
The LSC and IS-MPMI Board realize that the limited travel funds do not allow us to support all student and postdoc attendees (we wish we could!). Nevertheless, we would strongly encourage you to come to the congress in Portland regardless of the ultimate sources of funding that support your travel. Personally, I cannot overemphasize the positive impact that attending an IS-MPMI congress could have on the career of a student/postdoc/early career professional, especially if they are a first-time IS-MPMI Congress attendee. I remember my first time attending an IS-MPMI Congress (Interlaken, Switzerland, 1990). That congress was such an eye-opening experience for me, listening to one amazing talk after another describing major advances in the study of rhizobia, agrobacteria and various pathogens. It was in that congress, after listening to the inspiring talks by Fred Ausubel, Brian Staskawicz, and Jeff Dangl on the development of the Arabidopsis-Pseudomonas syringae pathosystem for cloning avirulence genes and studying plant defense responses, when I began to think about possibly using this system for my future study of bacterial pathogenesis and disease susceptibility. This type of IS-MPMI Congress experience is not unique to me as students in my own lab have come back from these meetings with a renewed enthusiasm and better perspective as well. I can easily imagine students/postdocs who attend the congress in Portland will be similarly inspired to nurture some creative ideas that will eventually help to launch their scientific careers. Plus, how often do you get a chance to talk to a large number of peers and friends whose scientific interests are so closely aligned with your own? My bottom line: please take advantage of the IS-MPMI congress venue to communicate your exciting findings and to network with colleagues who could one day help your career, either directly or indirectly.
25 February 2016 – Washington DC, USA—On 25 February 2016, a group of scientific societies, companies, research institutes, and governmental agencies launched the Phytobiomes Roadmap presenting a new vision for agriculture to increase health, productivity, and sustainability of our current cropping and forest systems.