Plant pathologists of the world unite at ICPP23

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 the 12th International Congress of Plant Pathology (ICPP2023). The Bacterial Plant Diseases Programme was well represented with posters and/or oral presentations from the Caliber, Ralstonia Phage, Xanthomonas Threats and Pseudomonas Prunus projects. In addition, Saskia Hogenhout’s talk included some work from the Brigit project and we also spotted a member of the Bac-Stop project who was attending as a delegate.

Starting with satellites

Several satellite meetings took place during the weekend before the main conference. On the first day, I attended a very interesting satellite on ‘Plant health starts with seed health’ which brought together researchers, seed companies and policy regulators. Their work is important for some of the bacterial plant diseases that we study. On the second day, I attended a satellite on Ralstonia solanacearum organised by colleagues from the Ralstonia Phage project. Colleagues from Fera, Andy Aspin and Jenny Cole, attended satellites on culture collections, Pectobacteriaceae, and the European conference on Xylella fastidiosa.

Coming together for the main conference

The main conference kicked off on Monday 21 August. Important themes of the conference were food security, invasive and emerging plant diseases and the global plant health assessment. Other topics included molecular plant-microbe interactions, new developments in plant disease management, advances in monitoring, host range of plant pathogens, biological control, bacteriophages, urban environment, genome editing and forest pathology issues.

We had daily plenary sessions in a huge amphitheatre. Highlights of the keynote sessions included a talk by Cindy Morris on the One Health programme, and a talk on empowering indigenous people to respond to invasive pathogens by Melanie Mark-Shadbolt from New Zealand. Silvia Restrepo received the Jakob Eriksson prize and presented a talk on her journey studying plant pathology in Colombia.

Choices, choices

There were also many smaller concurrent sessions each day. Choosing which talks to attend was not easy as there were so many interesting topics. Sometimes the smaller rooms were full, leaving people queuing outdoors. So that people didn’t miss out popular sessions were also screened in the amphitheatre. This was the case for the very well attended session on ‘Pathovars of Pseudomonas and Xanthomonas spp.: do they really exist?’. I presented results from the Xanthomonas Threats project supporting the existence of pathovars or subspecies of Xanthomonas campestris based on genomics and pathogenicity. This session had lively discussions as the concept of pathovar was considered outdated by some presenters. This is due to the difficulty in establishing the host range of some disease complexes e.g. diseases caused by Pseudomonas syringae and some Xanthomonas pathovars that attack tomato or wheat plants. The main conference also included a session on the latest advancements on Ralstonia species. It included interesting talks on global distribution and the use of resistance to control these pathogens.

Connecting and conversing

The posters were displayed in two sessions, each with over 500 posters. As the posters were displayed for 2-3 days and food stations were nearby, we managed to have very interesting conversations with colleagues and collaborators. We met lots of new people including many enthusiastic students working on bacterial diseases, who were always willing to present their work and answer our questions.

Hot, but not bothered

Lyon is well situated for a large conference and transport links to travel in France are very good, but we had to adapt to the heat as record temperatures hit over 40°C in the week. The heat made walking a bit more challenging than expected and most people stayed indoors in the air-conditioned conference spaces. That meant all sessions were very well attended! The days were also very long starting around 8:30am and finishing after 7pm. But we were kept well fed and hydrated with plenty of croissants and pain-au-chocolat at coffee breaks. The evenings were cooler so we enjoyed walks and meals out in Lyon, seeing a bit more of the city. The conference dinner was at Imagine Circus so our meal was served in a circus tent with aerial performers and a comedy act.

Summing up and ceremony

The last session focused on highlights from the conference, showing how difficult it is to summarise such a big event. A survey to participants revealed that they felt the major changes/advancements showcased had been achieved in sequencing, genomics and gene editing. The main challenges included climate change, AI, biocontrol and genetic modification. The conclusion was that plant pathologists and field practitioners are more needed than ever! The closing session also included well-deserved awards to long-serving plant pathologists, and the ceremonial passing of the International Society of Plant Pathology (ISPP) flag from current ISPP President Jan Leach, President, to Yong-Hwan Lee incoming President for 2023-2028.

This conference was a great opportunity to showcase our work as it was very well attended and relatively close to us (at around 500 miles from London). The next ICPP conference will be in the Gold Coast, Australia, so to attend it, we will require a trip of over 10,000 miles across the globe!

Recordings of many of the conference sessions are available to watch on the ICPP 2023 website.

You can also view the programme: ICPP2023-programme-VF_030823.pdf and abstract book: ICPP2023-BOOK-ABSTRACTS-VF.pdf