Rust Fungi Genomics and Surveillance Adventures

A symposium in celebration of Les Szabo’s career
Nov 1, 2021 1:00 PM

Zoom

Schedule
1:00 Welcome and introductions
1:10 Dave Hodson, CIMMYT, Mexico.
“Advances in wheat rust surveillance in East Africa and South Asia”.
1:40 Mogens Hovmøller, Aarhus University. Denmark.

“New leaf rust races! The job security is nice, but how does it happen”.
2:10 John Fellers, USDA-ARS Manhattan.
“”
2:40 Break
3:00 Cathie Aime, Purdue University.
“Reconciling the rusts and the consequences of a complex life cycle”.
3:30 Melania Figueroa, CSIRO, Australia.
“Secrets whispered by rust chromosomes”.
4:00 Les Szabo, USDA-ARS and University of Minnesota.
“Meanderings of a molecular biologist in the wonderful world of rust fungi”.

https://umn.zoom.us/j/98653300941?pwd=dEc1N0Z1cUZTVitvTW5oUDVhYWxLZz09

https://plpa.cfans.umn.edu/events/rust-fungi-genomics

Event Speaker

Dave Hodson

Dr Dave Hodson is a Principal Scientist with CIMMYT (International Maize & Wheat
Improvement Center) currently based in Mexico after spending the last 7 years in Ethiopia. For
the last 15 years he has worked on developing and coordinating a Global Wheat Rust Monitoring
System in response to the threat posed by wheat stem rust Ug99. The wheat rust monitoring
system now covers approximately 40 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America. He also
coordinates a surveillance system for Maize Lethal Necrosis (MLN) in Eastern and Southern
Africa. In addition, he is involved in projects developing rust early warning in East Africa and
South Asia, and also on improved pathogen and host diagnostics using molecular tools in
Ethiopia. His research focuses on the surveillance and monitoring of emerging cereal disease
threats and the application of geo-spatial technology for improved decision support.

Advances in Wheat Rust Surveillance in East Africa and South Asia - Dave Hodson

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTQmgCPAwsg

 

Mogens Hovmøller

Dr. Mogens Støvring Hovmøller is a Professor of plant pathology in the Department of Agroecology at Aarhus University, Denmark. He earned his Master and Ph.D. degrees from the Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University. His career has followed a straight path from research assistant and senior researcher at the Danish Institute of Plant and Soil Science to his appointment as professor mso at Aarhus University. In his research, Mogens Støvring Hovmøller has a strong focus on pathogenic fungi affecting agricultural crops. Rust fungi on cereals and grasses is a main current topic, which has impact on food security in many areas in Africa and Asia, but also impacts agricultural productivity in Europe, including organic crop production. One of his special responsibilities has been to develop and lead the Global Rust Reference Center. GRRC has an international reputation as a leading hub for research in epidemiology and population biology of wheat rust fungi, attracting funding from multiple national and international institutes and foundations. 

John Fellers

Dr. John Fellers is a USDA-ARS Research Molecular Biologist and Adjunct Professor in the Department of Plant Pathology at Kansas State University. He earned B.S and M.S. degrees in Agronomy from Oklahoma State University and a Ph.D. in Crop Science from the University of Kentucky. Dr. John Fellers has specialized in host-pathogen interactions between wheat and pathogens ranging from Triticum mosaic virus to Puccinia triticina. His recent genomics work on Puccinia triticina has established the evolutionary trajectory of the global wheat leaf rust fungus population.

New Leaf Rust Races - John Fellers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ARGGnmXZAU&t=2s

 

Cathie Aime

Cathie Aime is Professor of Mycology, Department of Botany & Plant Pathology and Director of the Arthur Fungarium and Kriebel Herbarium at Purdue University, and a Purdue University Faculty Scholar. She received her M.S. and Ph.D. in Biology at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University under the guidance of Orson K. Miller, Jr., and conducted post-doctoral research at the University of Oxford under Lorna Casselton.  Cathie’s research combines expeditionary field work and traditional approaches with molecular genetics and multi-omics approaches to understand fungal diversity and evolution. Areas of specialization include tropical basidiomycetes, systematics of early diverging basidiomycete lineages (including smuts and yeasts), evolution of rust fungi, and epidemiology of tropical tree diseases.  Cathie is a former officer of the MSA and past Managing Editor of the journal Mycologia, and is currently Vice President of the International Commission on the Taxonomy of Fungi, an executive committee member of the International Mycological Association, and Vice President of the Mycological Society of America. Cathie is a fellow of the Mycological Society of America, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Explorer’s Club, and the Linnean Society of London.

Reconciling the Rusts and the Consequences of a Complex Life Cycle - M. Catherine Aime

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0A-gNf6vZ8&t=2s

 

Melania Figueroa

Dr. Melania Figueroa received a B.S. in Biology from the University of Costa Rica and a Ph.D. in Plant Pathology from the University of Arizona. She was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Department of Botany and Plant Pathology at Oregon State University before joining the USDA-ARS in the Forage Seed and Cereal Research Unit. Next, she was appointed as a tenure-track Assistant and then Associate Professor in the Department of Plant Pathology at the University of Minnesota. Since 2019 Figueroa serves as Group Leader in the Agriculture and Food Business Unit at The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in Canberra, Australia. In this role, she manages a portfolio that comprises research on crop pests and diseases including cereal rusts. Her group aims to provide genetic solutions to agronomic problems at a global scale. Research advances in genomics research led by Figueroa have elucidated novel mechanisms of virulence evolution in rust fungi. She is currently leading efforts for genomic comparisons of global rust fungal populations and is interested in dissecting mechanisms underpinning genetic diversity. Figueroa’s goal is to identify pathogen effectors and markers to use as virulence predictors and develop a framework to understand pathogen susceptibility in cereals.

Les Szabo

Dr. Les J. Szabo is a USDA-ARS Research Geneticist and Adjunct Professor at the University of Minnesota Department of Plant Pathology. Les grew up around Seattle, Washington and earned his degrees at Washington State University, Michigan State University, and Oregon State University. He was a Postdoctoral Fellow at Rockefeller University before joining the USDA-ARS Cereal Disease Lab in 1998. He was tasked with studying what was considered an obscure pathogen at the time, Puccinia graminis f. sp. tritici. His early work laid the groundwork for genomics by showing that rust fungi have large complex genomes and Pgt has 18 chromosomes. This was followed by the first genetic map of Pgt in the year 2000. In 2011, Les reported the genome sequence of Pgt using Sanger sequencingThis was the first genome sequence of an obligate biotrophic plant pathogenic fungus known to science. Throughout his career, Les applied the latest technologies to studying Pgt, starting with AFLPs and culminating with high-throughput and long-read sequencing via Oxford Nanopore and Pac-Bio. Over the past ten years, Les has been the go-to diagnostician for tracking the movement of Pgt around the globe. Les developed a 3,000-SNP array for studying the molecular diversity of Pgt and used this resource to develop diagnostic assays. Les J. Szabo is retiring in December 2021.

Meandering of a Molecular Biologist in the Wonderful World of Rust Fungi - Les J. Szabo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rLkshd32Kk