Biostimulants
Program:
09:00-09:10 Welcome
09:10-10:00 Prof Danny Geelen, Department Plants and Crops, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Belgium
Biostimulants and plant hormones : mode of action
10:00-10:50 Dr Lien González Pérez, Universidad de Las Américas (UDLA)Direction of Research and Community Outreach, Quito, Ecuador
Plant biostimulants based on xyloglucan oligosaccharides to improve growth and tolerance to abiotic stress in plants
10:50-11:00 Break
11:00-11:20 Dr Juan Carlos Cabrera, Fyteko SA, Belgium
Bioengineered naturally occurring signal molecules, a new generation of plant biostimulants
11:20-11:40 Dr Oliver Grunert, Aphea.Bio NV, Belgium
Aphea.Bio's microbial biostimulants entering commercial phase and exhibiting substantial yield increase in cereals and maize
11:40-12:00 Dr.Lukasz Tarkowski, Institut Agro, INRAE, IRHS, SFR QUASAV, Université d’Angers, Angers, France
Activation of tomato seed defenses through integration of seed and defense priming
12:00-12:30 Dr. Marco Zarattini, Laboratory of Crop Production and Biostimulation, Brussels Bioengineering School, Université libre de Bruxelles, Belgium
The recognition of damage-associated molecular patterns confer resistance to biotic and abiotic stress conditions
Abstract:
Prof Danny Geelen - Department Plants and Crops, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Belgium
Biostimulants and plant hormones : mode of action
Plant biostimulants are typically categorized according to their source, as extract, hydrolysate, acids, other chemicals, or microbes. Because a wealth of activities has been reported, gaining insight into the mode of action is complicated. It is therefore important to dive deeper into the processes that underly plant growth and development and the biochemical processes that are activated in response to abiotic stress. To illustrate how biostimulant research may develop towards a deeper understanding of how biostimulants work, I will focus on the activities of plant hormones. In recent years major progress has been reported on how plant hormones regulate growth and development. It is these very same processes that are being influenced by plant biostimulants, either through modulation of hormone signaling, or possibly indirect by influencing other signaling molecules such as reactive oxygen species. With this talk, I aim to give a background of cellular processes one should study to make steps towards revealing the mode of action of biostimulants.
Prof Lien González Pérez, Universidad de Las Américas (UDLA), Direction of Research and Community Outreach, Quito, Ecuador
Plant biostimulants based on xyloglucan oligosaccharides to improve growth and tolerance to abiotic stress in plants
Considerable evidence supports the hypothesis that oligosaccharides derived from cell wall polysaccharides are important regulatory molecules in plants. Xyloglucan oligosaccharides (XGOs) derived from the hydrolysis of plant cell wall xyloglucan, are a new class of naturally occurring biostimulants that exert a positive effect on plant growth and morphology and can enhance plant’s tolerance to stress. In this work, we summarize the results obtained from the evaluation of Xyloglucan oligosaccharides (XGOs) derived from tamarind (Tamarindus indica L.) on plant growth and on expression of genes related to cell signaling, metabolism and division, transcriptional control, and stress response. We demonstrated that part of their growth effects has been attributed to increases in cell division rates. This presentation will also explain the results obtained with XGOs in plants grown under salt stress conditions.
Dr Juan Carlos Cabrera, Fyteko SA, Belgium
Bioengineered naturally occurring signal molecules, a new generation of plant biostimulants
The development of biosolutions enabling more resilient agriculture has recently gained momentum due to the increasing environmental awareness of the population and some favorable changes in the European regulatory framework. Commercial plant biostimulants based on beneficial microbes or complex mixtures extracted from natural sources, have successfully been used to optimize plant nutrients uptakes, crop yields, qualities, and tolerance to abiotic stress. In this work, the approach is a bit different and consists in using a single and well-defined biomolecule acting as a signal in plants to develop new plant biostimulants. Recently, Fyteko has discovered that cell wall-derived hydroxycinnamic oligomers can act as a pre-activator of the plant tolerance mechanism to stressful situations. When exogenously applied on plants, this biomolecule triggers a significant change in genes transcription and this reprogramming of the plant metabolism modulates some key plant responses to abiotic stress, including the accumulation of osmoprotectants like proline and other low molecular weight metabolites, changes in the activities of ROS protective enzymes (SOD, APX) and accumulation of anthocyanins, among others. In addition to the experimental results explaining the mode of action of this signal molecule on plants, an overview of the results of four years of experimentation with different field crops in different countries will also be discussed.
Dr. Cabrera (PhD in chemistry from Havana University, Cuba and PhD in biology from Namur University, Belgium) conducted post-doctoral work at Valencia University, Spain, National Institute for Agronomic Research INRA-Nantes, France and Namur University, Belgium. He is R&D director and co-founder of Fyteko SA, Belgium, and associate researcher at the University of Mons. He is mostly interested in the development of new bioactive molecules acting as biopesticides, bioenhancers and plant biostimulants.
Dr Oliver Grunert, Dr Steven Vandenabeele, Aphea.Bio NV, Zwijnaarde, Belgium
Aphea.Bio's microbial biostimulants entering commercial phase and exhibiting substantial yield increase in cereals and maize
Through Aphea.Bio’s proprietary APEX high-throughput pipeline, root-associated microbial strains for row crops (wheat and corn) were isolated that generate a substantial increase in crop yield under reduced nutrient conditions.
The combination of de novo isolations from target crops, microbiome-guided selection, high-throughput glasshouse screening and extensive field trial testing, enabled us to prioritize several candidate products for commercial launch on the European and US markets within the next two years. Various strains have been isolated that performed specifically well in either maritime and continental climate zones, thus leading to an additional product differentiation with yield increases exceeding in some cases 10%.
This presentation aims at demonstrating the different steps in Aphea.Bio’s specific screening and R&D technology platform that led to the identification of high performing strains and, subsequently, to production and formulation specificities, necessary for the preparation of a successful market launch. Aphea.Bio’s technology pipeline is set up to further generate high-performing generations of products and tackle different crops and traits in the near future.
Dr. Łukasz Paweł Tarkowski, Institut Agro, INRAE, IRHS, SFR QUASAV, Université d’Angers, Angers, France
Activation of tomato seed defenses through integration of seed and defense priming.
The importance of seedborne pathogens in spreading diseases and initiating epidemics is often overlooked due to the current lack of knowledge on seed defense mechanisms and seed-pathogen interactions, although yield losses due to seedborne pathogens have a major economic impact. The SucSeed project aims to fill this knowledge gap by developing sustainable strategies to stimulate pathogen resistance from the seed stage by working on four different crops in parallel (tomato, colza, wheat and bean). For the tomato part, our approach consisted in combining seed priming techniques with treatments with resistance inducing molecules (defense priming). Seed priming is a well-established group of techniques aimed to ameliorate seed germination parameters, while defense priming is one of the most promising biocontrol strategies at our disposal. The aim of this approach is to induce seed defenses to isolate and identify novel potential biocontrol molecules to use at the seed stage. After a first stage of technique optimization, results from tomato seeds treated with methyl jasmonate (MeJA) and β-aminobutyric acid (BABA) showed extensive transcriptome reprogramming. To correlate these data with pathogen resistance, we produced seeds exudates from MeJA-treated seeds and tested their effect on the growth of bacterial and fungal pathogens by developing a 96-well plate assay based on nephelometry (for fungi) and spectrometry at 600 nm (for bacteria). Results obtained showed a marked growth inhibition of exudates derived from MeJA treatments on fungal growth. Our next step is the identification of the molecules responsible of the fungistatic effect present in exudates derived from MeJA treatments.
Dr Marco Zarattini, F.R.S.-FNRS postdoctoral fellow - Laboratory of Crop Production and Biostimulation, Brussels Bioengineering School, Université libre de Bruxelles, Belgium
The recognition of damage-associated molecular patterns confer resistance to biotic and abiotic stress conditions
The never-ending battle between plants and pathogens has driven both partners to develop either complex immune system responses or virulence strategies to conquer each other. Pathogens secrete cell wall degrading enzymes (CWDEs) to break down plant cell walls: the first barrier between plants and the surrounding environment. Plants can sense wall damages and pathogens invasion by detecting Damage Associated Molecular Patterns (DAMPs), thus activating the Damage Triggered Immunity (DTI). In this warfare, carbohydrate-based DAMPs play a crucial role as DTI triggering molecules in plants. Since the mid-1980s, advances in the biology of DTI activation concentrated primarily on DAMPs generated by hydrolytic CWDEs. The recent discovery of Lytic Polysaccharide Monooxygenases (LPMOs), copper-dependent oxidative enzymes catalyzing an alternative polysaccharide cleavage mechanism, rather than the classical hydrolysis, opened a new field of plant elicitation. In this talk, I will discuss how LPMO-generated cellulose oligosaccharides can help plants shape their innate immune system toward biotic and abiotic stress tolerance.