Title: Grapevine downy mildew resistance mediated by susceptibility genes

(Supervisor: Dr. Claudio Moser; Co-supervisors: Dr. Jeroen Rouppe van der Voort, Dr. Tieme Zeilmaker, Dr. Silvia Vezzulli, Dr. Giulia Malacarne)

Being one of the most spread cultivations all over the world, grapevine has been studied for several aspects, including its resistance/susceptibility to pathogens. To reduce the use of environmentally-impacting fungicides, breeders have crossed the European Vitis vinifera with American and Asian wild species to obtain plants resistant the most important grape pathogens such as the oomycete Plasmopara viticola (causal agent of downy mildew). However till recently the wine quality derived from these plant-hybrids was clearly lower than that derived from pure V. vinifera varieties. Furthermore, dominantly inherited resistance has shown to be potentially overcome within few years. The identification of susceptibility genes in plants and crops, as factors required by the pathogen to infect the host-tissue has recently opened up their exploitation as an alternative strategy to breed resistant plants. Aim of this project is to investigate the role of recessively-inherited susceptibility genes, whose total or partial inactivation can lead to broad-spectrum and long-lasting resistance to downy mildew. The approach used for gene inactivation will be genome editing.

Biography and Contacts

Carlotta Pirrello was born in 1990 in San Miniato (PI). She graduated in 2014 in Agro-industrial Biotechnologies (104/110) at the University of Pisa where she also achieved her Master’s Degree in Plant and Microbial Biotechnologies (110/110 cum Laude) in 2016 presenting a thesis done during a six months internship at the Edmund Mach Foundation (FEM) on the study of terpenoids involved in the interaction between grapevine and Lobesia botrana. Before starting her PhD at FEM in November 2017, she spent six months at the University of Pisa working on the study of volatile aromatic compounds emitted by different varieties of grapevine under different sun exposure conditions.

carlotta.pirrello@guests.fmach.it
pirrello.carlotta@spes.uniud.it