The 18th International  Fusarium Laboratory Workshop (IFLW), an internationally renowned training course for all aspects of Fusarium biology, was hosted at Kansas State University, in Manhattan, Kansas, USA from June 25 to June 30, 2017. This yearly workshop was convened by Professor John Leslie, with several international Fusarium experts as guest instructors. The Mycokey project ensured the co-organization of the IFLW with Kansas State University through the participation of Dr. Antonio Logrieco as an instructor and of the post-doc Alessandra Villani as participant and asworkshop assistant. The Workshop had 50 participants from numerous countries in several continents: Africa(2), Australia (5),the Americas (38), and Europe (5). The workshop participants were introduced to various topics concerning Fusarium and related mycotoxins detection, for risk evaluation of pre- and post-harvest management, based also on Mycokey results. Participants learned how to use a microscope for identifying the main morphological traits useful to distinguish more than 60 species of Fusarium, how to make tests for vegetative compatibility groups (VCGs) and cross-fertility, and how to extract DNA,  perform PCR for amplifying DNA, and analyze DNA sequences. The workshop was split into 40% keynote speakers’ lectures and the remaining 60% of the time was spent in the laboratory, working with standard Fusarium strains for each species.

Next year the 2018 Fusarium Laboratory Workshop will be held at ISPA-CNR in Bari during the month of June, and will be held in collaboration with the Mycokey project.

http://www.plantpath.k-state.edu/events/fusarium/