Introduction

Introduction

Friends, family, and colleagues,

As many of you know, I'll be spending the majority of summer 2015 in China for my PhD research. One of the biggest questions I get is “So what will you be doing over there?” We have been fortunate enough to find collaborators at a breeding institute in the Jiangsu province. The institute is located in the heart of Nanjing, a major city located in eastern coast of the country, about 4 hours from Shanghai.

I'm in the Jiangsu province located on the east side of the country (pink). Courtesy: http://www.beijingrelocation.com/blog/map-of-chinas-provinces/

The academy is known as the Jiangsu Academy of Agricultural Science (JAAS) which was founded in 1932. Within that academy, we are working with the institute of vegetable crops. Within the institute, we are working with the cucurbit breeding research group. While the group is primarily focused on breeding, they have agreed to support us through a collaboration. The purpose of the trip is primarily academic, we hope to complete four things while we are here (this is the really boring technical stuff, feel free to skip it unless you are a huge nerd and actually like this stuff).

 

This is the logo for the academy where I'll be working

1.     Single-spore the isolates: With any isolate of the fungi, we need to ensure that we’re working with one isolate and not a mixture of two or more. So, this first thing we do is we get every culture to be produced from one spore. That way, we know that we are truly dealing with one isolate.

2.     Pathogenicity testing: Just as there is diversity in any other population, we are seeking to characterize how pathogenic these strains are. We do this by inoculating a plant with the spores and observe how quickly disease develops.

3.     Fungicide sensitivity: A lot of the fungicides registered in China are also registered in the US. We need to get an idea of how effective they are in China compared to the US.

4.     DNA extraction: Federal law requires that I get a lot of permits to bring back live isolates. However, they have much fewer restrictions on DNA (the genetic material in all the cells). With the DNA, we can look at the population structure, fungicide sensitivity, and pathogenicity as well.

 

This is the fungus I study. It may look harmless, but it's a ruthless watermelon killer!

Below are some frequently asked questions I have received leading up to the trip.

So why China?

We chose to come to China for a variety of reasons. First, we have a collaboration already set-up, so that makes it very easy. Second, China produces nearly 20% of all the watermelon seed imported into the US. The fungus I work on is seed-borne, meaning that it can survive in/on the seed and can travel long distances as a result.

We suspect that isolates from China are coming to the US via seed and may already have resistance to fungicides before growers in the US can manage them. We hope that during this trip, we can find evidence either supporting or refuting this hypothesis.

How long will you be in China?

I arrived in China on May 9^th, 2015 and will be here until July 20^th 2015, so about 2 months.

Will you be able to travel while you’re in China?

We will see. I have a lot of work to do and that is my priority. There is a lot of history in Nanjing itself, so even if I’m only able to travel locally, I’ll still be able to see a lot within the region.

So what is it you do again?

I’m a student looking at a fungal disease on watermelon that is a major problem in both the US and China. The fungus is called Didymella bryoniae which causes the disease gummy stem blight. You can learn more about the fungus here and more about the disease and its management here.

I'll try to post often. Feel free to comment with any questions.

Mason