Black rot is a disease of brassicas (cabbages, broccoli, brussel sprouts etc). It is caused by the bacterium Xanthomonas campestris pv. campestris (shortened to Xcc). Infected plants have characteristic v-shaped lesions at the edges of leaves. The disease is found …
Black rot (Xanthomonas campestris pv. campestris) Read More »
The genus Xanthomonas includes bacterial plant pathogens of more than 350 plant species including many crop plants. For example Xanthomonas campestris pv. campestris (Xcc) causes black rot in brassicas such as cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, kale, oilseed rape, swede, …
In the last few months of the Bacterial Plant Diseases Programme our communications lead Sarah McLusky has been working with the projects and graphic designer Thomas Pawley to create summaries of their research and findings. Each summary give some background …
By Joana Vicente and Andrew Aspin Culture collections are repositories of preserved and authenticated microbes for use in research. Some of our Bacterial Plant Disease projects are generating large collections of isolates and/or are using isolates from in-house or public …
By Joana Vicente and Andrew Aspin As we are approaching the final stages of most of our BPD projects, we are turning our attention to impact, publications, stakeholders’ engagement, and dissemination. Other important aspects of these final stages also involve …
How BPD projects are using and contributing to culture collections Read More »
by Sarah McLusky, BPD Communications and Events Coordinator I’ve been involved in science communication for over 20 years but, until recently, I’d never really thought much about making Wikipedia part of my toolbox. If fact when I was a college …
In this blog Joana Vicente reports from the 12th International Congress of Plant Pathology (ICPP2023) in Lyon, France. From 19 to 25 August 2023 more than 2400 participants from 88 countries (including 550 PhD students) gathered in Lyon, France, for …
This is the final report from our placement programme. Here three members of the Xanthomonas Threats project, Adam Bryning, Jenny Cole and Joana Vicente (all Fera), report on their visit to two Lincolnshire seed companies – Elsoms and Sakata. Discussing diagnostics at …
Curious about cabbages: Visiting Lincolnshire Seed Companies Read More »
On 3 June 2023 our Xanthomonas Threats project hosted a stall at the Kenilworth Show. Here Shannon Greer and Joana Vincente report on their day. The Kenilworth Show is an annual agricultural show that has been running nearly uninterrupted for …
Our final placement report is from Robyn Babb. Robyn is a PhD student with the Xanthomonas Threats project. She visited the University of Strathclyde and the University of Glasgow. Robyn’s placement was made possible thanks to additional funding from UKRI …
Bacteriocins to help brassicas: Robyn’s placement report Read More »
This spring we were lucky enough to get additional funding from UKRI to enable some of our researchers to go on placements to different work environments to learn skills and build relationships. We’ll be sharing reports from all of the …
Finding out about fruit: Fera team visits NIAB East Malling Read More »
On Wednesday 10 May 2023 as part of Plant Health Week 2023 we hosted a webinar looking at four different bacterial species and how they affect our crops and food supplies. Replays of the presentations are available now on our …
For Plant Health Week 2023 we will be discussing various bacterial diseases and how they threaten our food supply. Bacterial diseases affect many food plants reducing yields and contributing to shortages. Emerging diseases not yet present in the UK also …
The impact of bacterial diseases on crops and food supply Read More »
Joana Vicente, Coordination Team and Xanthomonas Threats, reports from two recent plant health meetings. Defra (one of our funders) supports four long-term Genetic Improvement Networks (GINs) to improve major UK crop varieties. The four GINs are: ‘The GINs aim to …
Find out about the science behind our 2023 bookmark images
Gareth Thomas (BAC-STOP) reports from the 2023 International Plant Health Conference in London. From 21-23 September 2023, I attended the first International Plant Health Conference (IPHC) in the Queen Elizabeth II Centre, London. The conference was coordinated by Defra and …
In the second of our Fighting Bac workshops our researchers will share new approaches for identifying and modelling disease outbreaks. The workshop will focus particularly on the next steps for translating these findings into real world innovations and how stakeholders …
Joanna Vicente reports from the 14th International Conference on Plant Pathogenic Bacteria (ICPPB) which took place 3-8 July in Assisi, Italy. Surrounded by sunflower fields and olive trees, 196 delegates gathered in the idyllic setting of the Hotel Valle di …
ICPPB 2022 – Discussing diseases and dancing in the rain Read More »
If you are a stakeholder or a non-specialist looking for information about bacterial plant diseases then some of the resources in this section might be useful. Do get in touch if you can’t find what you’re looking for. And if …
It’s Plant Health Week 2022 and we are celebrating the benefits of healthy plants. An important part of keeping plants healthy is understanding the relationships between plants and bacteria to help manage bacterial diseases. Plants have a microbiome too Just …