Welcome back: Dr. Naivy Nava visits us for two weeks to finalize some crucial experiments on chitosan protecting plants from nematodes.

Dr. Naivy Nava visits us for a short research stay in our group during which she intends to follow-up on her doctoral project on developing chitosans as a plant biopesticide protecting plants from soil-born nematodes. Root-infecting nematodes are increasingly threatening many crop plants. One problem is that nematicides tend to be highly toxic, so that many of them are no longer approved for agricultural uses. Therefore, biological alternatives, ideally by strengthening the plants’ own immune system, are urgently required. This is where our chitosans might help. Naivy had successfully screened different of our well-characterized “second generation” 2G-chitosans and identified one that can protect tomato plants from one of the most devastating nematodes when applied in the correct way. She performed extensive studies to understand the mode of action of this chitosan, and this involved transcriptomic studies in the treated plants. However, the time of her doctoral project did not suffice to finalize these experiments fully. Naivy is currently working in the Irish company Brandon Bioscience where she generates and translates scientific data of the biostimulants to the technical and research teams of customers worldwide, as well as the obtention of certifications for different products. Now she is back in our lab for some weeks in order to bring her important work on plant nematode resistance to the point where we can publish the results in a high-ranking journal. Naivy: welcome back and best success!