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Scientists from around the world will benefit from five days’ training at the John Innes Centre on bacteria that cause disease in economically important crops including maize, potato and apple.
They will learn the complex techniques required to stitch together the genomes of phytoplasmas. Phytoplasmas are a class of bacteria able to modify their plant hosts to make them more attractive to insects. The bacteria need both plants and insects for survival. They live in the sap of plants and are spread by insects such as leafhoppers.
The bacteria cannot be cultured so infected plants and insects are sequenced and phytoplasma sequences are selected from the mixture of DNA.
Trainees will have access to genome sequence data from phytoplasmas that cause disease in tomato, potato, Chrysanthemum, Napier grass, maize, lime, apple, pear, stone fruit, grapevine and coconut. The data were obtained from EU countries, Eastern Europe, Kenya, Ghana and Brazil.
This school is part of the Phytoplasma Genome Sequencing Initiative (PGSI) to sequence more phytoplasma genomes. It will attract 17 scientists from 29 April to 3 May. The trainers are:
- Saskia Hogenhout (JIC, Norwich, UK)
- Xavier Foissac (INRA, Bordeaux, France)
- Michael Kube (Humboldt-University, Berlin, Germany)
