NEWS

The 30th Europe-wide seminar of the series supported by the European Plant Science Organisation (EPSO) and aimed at the Plant Science community and its stakeholders.

TTT: The seminar will be held online each third Thursday of the month at three (CET).

On 15th February 2024 at 15:00 (CET) we will present three talks exploring “Harnessing Photobiology for Future Plants”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The seminars will be hosted on Zoom and last approximately 1.5 hours. Numbers will be limited to 300 attendees and therefore please register early if you would like to join. There will be ample opportunities to ask questions and join the debate. So please join us to support this new and exciting initiative for European Plant Science by following this link just prior to the start of the seminar.

EPSO members register in advance for this meeting: registration link

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

In the coming months we will be on the lookout for talented plant scientists among the EPSO membership to present their findings and perspectives to the EPSO seminar series. If we approach you to talk, we hope you will be happy to support the initiative. This is a fantastic opportunity for both eminent world leaders and talented up-and-coming early career researchers to present their research to an international audience and to network with potential collaborators. If you wish to suggest a theme for one of the upcoming seminars and / or nominate yourself or one of your colleagues to give a seminar, we most welcome your suggestions. Please contact Tim George ([email protected]) to provide your name and potential talk title.

We look forward to seeing you all for the 30th EPSO seminar on the 15th February 2024.

 Tim George, Alan Schulman and Marie-Theres Hauser

EPSO Plant Science Seminar Series Organising Committee

 Click here to read: Full EPSO news item

 

Contacts:

Tim George, Hutton / UK & EPSO Board

Alan Schulman, LUKE / FI & Adviser to the EPSO Board

Marie-Theres Hauser BOKU / AT & EPSO Board

 

National funders in the European Research Area Network on Sustainable Crop Production (SusCrop ERA-net) together with experts from science and stakeholders developed (supported by 2 workshops)  the white paper on ‘Future Research Needs in Sustainable Agriculture’. 

The four main research needs are:

• Topic 1: Knowledge generation in relation to nutritional value and health benefits of protein / niche crops;
• Topic 2: Knowledge generation and transfer on multi-stress resistance for stable yield;
• Topic 3: Innovation pipeline: Protein / niche crops for food and feed value chains: How to build a value chain for uncultivated protein / niche crops;
• Topic 4: Impact assessment and trade-offs.

The white paper is available both on the SusCrop website and to download here.

Please disseminate this widely for consideration at European as well as national levels.

Contacts:

Heather McKhann, INRAE & SusCrop ERA-Net (prepared synthesis as white paper)

Christian Breuer, PTJ & SusCrop ERA-Net co-ordinator

Karin Metzlaff, EPSO & official observer SusCrop ERA-Net

The EPSO Working Group on Future Proofed Crops is pleased to announce that its first workshop will take place online on 13 July 2023.

This first workshop has three aims. Firstly, we will hear brief introductions from each participant to become familiar with each other and start networking scientists in the WG referring to the three pillars – improving abiotic stress, photosynthesis and resource use efficiency of crops – to increase crop yield in a stable way and adapt to climate change and be more sustainable.

Secondly, we will hear two short summaries – of the CropBooster recommendations and of the EPSO submission to the Horizon Europe consultation. Thirdly, we will discuss the next steps of the WG, including the options to implement the research foreseen.

Recommendations arising from the workshop will be shared with the scientific community, the European Commission and national agencies.

WG members please register with [email protected] by 30 April.

EPSO member organisations who have not yet confirmed their two experts for the FPC WG can still discuss this internally and notify Karin, cc Sofia and the chairs, to become a member of this WG ideally by the end of April 2023 (we suggest 1-2 expert scientists per organisation interested in this subject). To enrol an expert, please provide the name, function in the institute, 1-3 keywords on their expertise and contact details. Please also inform René by 30 April if the expert(s) will join the 1st meeting on 13 July.

We look forward to e-meeting you in July!

René, Christine, Andreas, Francesco, Alain and Karin

Future Proofed Crops WG co-chairs: René Klein Lankhorst, Christine Raines, Andreas Weber, Francesco Loreto, Alain Gojon

EPSO Executive Director: Karin Metzlaff

Click here to read: The workshop Announcement 28.03.2023

• CropBooster: The CropBooster Roadmap; Executive Summary; Policy Brief; FES Special Issue
• EPSO: Contributions from plant research & innovation on the past, present & future of the European Research & Innovation Framework Programmes 2014-2027, 21.2.2023

Contacts:

René Klein Lankhorst, Christine Raines, Andreas Weber, Francesco Loreto, Alain Gojon and Karin Metzlaff

EPSO welcomes the European Commission consultation and provides input on the achievements and suggests where improve Horizon Europe and the next Framework Programme (FP) to have a higher impact. 

The European Research and Innovation FPs are crucial to enable scientists and innovators across Europe to collaborate to generate knowledge, to apply this knowledge to address today’s and future challenges and to help build a strong, competitive and resilient, inclusive and democratic European society and improve life on earth.

Plant scientists took an active role in the EU FPs from the start and want to contribute in the future.

They are active in pillar 1, mainly in the European Research Council and the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions, both working very well.

They could contribute more to pillar 2, particularly in cluster 6 on Food, bioeconomy, natural resources, agriculture and environment. To this end, we suggest the following improvements:

• Further implement the following concepts:
  • Address Food and Nutritional Security, environmental sustainability, biodiversity (natural and cultivated) and human health in parallel as much as possible.
  • Improve / adapt crops towards ‘Diverse crops for diverse diets and human health and resilient production’.
  • ‘Combine approaches on crop improvement, crop management and crop processing’.
  • Policy makers should define the goals but leave the pathways to how to achieve these open to the stakeholders
• Create a new heading ‘Enabling sustainable crop improvement’ in the Work Programme and / or partnership ‘CropBooster-Quest’:
  • CropBooster-Quest – Plant (systems) biology, crop improvement and plant breeding to achieve a critical mass investment enabling the community to substantially help addressing the challenges mentioned above and interacting with partnerships on biodiversity, agroecology, food systems.
  • To bridge the gap until a new partnership can be active, add the heading ‘Enabling sustainable crop improvement’ in the Work Programme.
• Better link the health cluster (1) with the food, agriculture, biotechnology cluster (6) to truly enable plant biologists, breeders, processors, nutritional scientist and health experts to interdisciplinary research and innovation to improve nutritional compounds in plants for the human diet, which are then further protected during crop processing and human digestion. In addition, plant made pharmaceuticals can be co-developed for medical purposes.

 All scientists would benefit from more general improvements in pillar 2 across all disciplines and sectors:

• Types of action: Add Research Actions (RAs) in pillar 2 to overcome the gap of collaborative basic research and complete the research and innovation cycle.
• Identify funding priorities: Consult European academic associations. Define the goals, but not the pathways to how to reach these to truly enable innovation.
• Implementation procedures: Increase trust in and flexibility for beneficiaries.

In the EPSO position paper we briefly explain each of these recommendations.

EPSO looks forward to further discuss and help implement these recommendations with colleagues from the European Commission and the Member State ministries and funders.

Click here to read: Full EPSO position paper on Horizon Europe and beyond

EPSO submission to the EC consultation is available here

Contacts:

Karin Metzlaff, EPSO Executive Director, BE

Odd Arne Rognli, NMBU, NO & EPSO President

We would like to announce the seventeenth of our Europe-wide seminar series by the European Plant Science Organisation (EPSO) and aimed at the Plant Science community and its stakeholders. In our second year, we continue to provide a stimulating set of seminars once a month on a hot and/or emerging topic in plant science, giving the floor to both eminent world leaders and talented up-and-coming early career researchers.

TTT: The seminar will be held online each third Thursday of the month at three (CET).

On 17th November 2022 at 15:00 (CET) we will present three talks exploring Using algae to diversify production systems

Dr. Anna Fricke, Leibniz Institute of Vegetable and Ornamental Crops, Großbeeren, Germany : “Use of algal biology to diversify production systems and sustainability

 

 

Prof Yagut Allahverdiyeva-Rinne, University of Turku, Finland: “Photosynthetic bio-manufacturing: From wastewater treatment to biocatalytic solar chemicals production”

 

 

Dr Yonghua Li-Beisson, CEA – CNRS – Université Aix Marseille, France: “Exploring algal lipid metabolism for a sustainable economy”

 

 

The seminars will be hosted on Zoom and last approximately 1.5 hours. Numbers will be limited to 300 attendees and therefore please register early if you would like to join. There will be ample opportunities to ask questions and join the debate. So please join us to support this initiative for European Plant Science by following this link just prior to the start of the seminar.

EPSO Members register in advance for this meeting:

https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZUkfu2hqjkiHdd_3qgdfqaVCnfiPlYHZ8ah

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

In the coming months we will be on the lookout for talented plant scientists among the EPSO membership to present their findings and perspectives to the EPSO seminar series. If we approach you to talk, we hope you will be happy to support the initiative. This is a fantastic opportunity for senior as well as early career researchers to present their research to an international audience and to network with potential collaborators. If you wish to suggest a theme for one of the spring seminars and / or nominate yourself or one of your colleagues to give a seminar, we most welcome your suggestions. Please contact Tim George ([email protected]) to provide your name and potential talk title.

We look forward to seeing you all for the next EPSO seminar on the 17th November 2022 

Read the full news item here

Tim George, Alan Schulman and Marie-Theres Hauser

EPSO Plant Science Seminar Series Organising Committee 

Contacts

Tim George, Hutton / UK & EPSO Board, [email protected]

Alan Schulman, LUKE / FI & EPSO President, [email protected]

Marie-Theres Hauser BOKU / AUT & EPSO Board, [email protected]

The 14th European-wide seminar of the series supported by the European Plant Science Organisation (EPSO) and aimed at the Plant Science community and its stakeholders.

TTT: usually, the seminar will be held online each third Thursday of the month at three (CET). This time it will be exceptionally on the fourth Thursday as the EPSO General Meeting wil be held the week before.

 

On 23^rd June 2022 at 15:00 (CET) we will present three talks exploring the “Future Proof Crops”

  

Dr. René Klein Lankhorst, Waginingen Plant Research, The Netherlands – “Towards the CropBooster Program”

Prof. Hans Lambers, University of Western Australia, Australia – “Exploring the potential to increase photosynthetic phosphorus-use efficiency”

Prof. Steve Long, University of Illinois, USA & University of Lancaster, UK – “Enhancing and Adapting Photosynthesis for Food Security under Climate Change”

 

 The seminars will be hosted on Zoom and last approximately 1.5 hours. Numbers will be limited to 300 attendees and therefore please register early if you would like to join. There will be ample opportunities to ask questions and join the debate. So please join us to support this new and exciting initiative for European Plant Science by following this link just prior to the start of the seminar.

 

EPSO members register in advance for this meeting:

https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZYqdeGvrzsuGNU2lIQ5Ro_1fa2v55IDv5a6

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

 

In the coming months we will be on the lookout for talented plant scientists among the EPSO membership to present their findings and perspectives to the EPSO seminar series. If we approach you to talk, we hope you will be happy to support the initiative. This is a fantastic opportunity for both eminent world leaders and talented up-and-coming early career researchers to present their research to an international audience and to network with potential collaborators. If you wish to suggest a theme for one of the autumn seminars and / or nominate yourself or one of your colleagues to give a seminar, we most welcome your suggestions. Please contact Tim George ([email protected]) to provide your name and potential talk title.

 

We look forward to seeing you all for the 14^th EPSO seminar on the 23^rdJune 2022

 

Tim George, Alan Schulman and Marie-Theres Hauser

EPSO Plant Science Seminar Series Organising Committee

 

 Click here to read: Full EPSO news item

 

Contacts:

• Tim George, Hutton / UK & EPSO Board
• Alan Schulman, LUKE / FI & EPSO President
• Marie-Theres Hauser BOKU / AT & EPSO Board