EVAg

CIRAD is the French agricultural research and international cooperation organization working for the sustainable development of tropical and Mediterranean regions. With those countries, it works to generate new knowledge, support agricultural development, and contribute to the debate on the main global issues concerning agriculture, food and rural territories. CIRAD has a global network of research and training platforms in partnership andregional offices,through which it works hand in handwith more than100 countries. It has a staff of 1650, including 800scientists. It has an annual budget of 200 million euros.

UMR BGPI -Biology and genetic of plant-pathogen interactions
The mixed-research unit "Biology and genetics of plant-pathogen interactions" (BGPI) from three public institutes CIRAD, INRA and Montpellier SupAgro is devoted to the study of plant diseases with the goal of proposing rational control methods and where state-of-the-art equipment are available for studying plant-pathogen-vector interactions. The scientists and technicians of BGPI unit, more than 80 permanents, work on viruses, bacteria and fungi (including quarantine organisms) that are pathogenic to temperate and tropical plants. Population dynamics of emerging diseases, mechanisms of pathogenicity and plant resistance are the main investigated domains. Knowledge transfer for quarantine management of genetics resources is also a strong component of our activities. Their competencies cover five scientific thematics : characterization of pathogens and mechanisms of pathogenicity, evolutionary biology of plant pathogens, study of plant resistance mechanisms, study of transmission mechanisms of disease vectored by insects and modeling of epidemics. All the thematics are covered by the virology group and this is relevant in case of outbreaks due to emerging/re-emerging viral pathogens and to assess the emerging viral plant disease risks.

Indeed, these multidisciplinary approaches are developed on research objects that are either theoretical models or diseases causing significant losses in Mediterranean and tropical agrosystems.The unit is conducting studies on vector-pathogen-plant interactions at different scales from molecule to the individual for mechanisms, at the population scale for the study of the biology and genetics of plant pathogen populations, and at the regional level for the analysis of epidemics. The work is carried out on a large number of pathogens (viruses, bacteria, fungi) and plants (banana, sugarcane, cocoa, yam, riz, wheat, stone fruit trees...). The unit directly implements its research results in quarantine and in the development of diagnostic tools.Plant virologist working at CIRAD are all grouped at UMR BGPI, involved in many research programs based on the characterization of RNA and DNA plant viruses from Mediterranean and tropical countries. They havea large collection of tropical plant viruses and antisera developed for the diagnosis.Our areas of interest in relation with EVAg are firstly the characterization of viruses from European and tropical countries, studies of disease emergence, and epidemio-surveillance strategies, Plant-virus-vector interactions and the definition of tools for diagnosis.We have also a strong interest in the extension of our work to partners because the majority of these actions are carried on with partners from universities and national institute in european and south countries.