Gearing up to fight the latest, most-potent strain of the fungus blamed for the Irish potato famine -- potato late blight -- more than three dozen scientists from around the world gathered at Cornell recently to formulate the initial stages of a battle plan.
Threatened with the spread of a new, more-aggressive strain of Phytophthora infestans, the researchers are concerned about the fungus' new fitness against humanity's efforts at eradication, the shortage of systemic chemicals to fight it, the few effective integrated control measures and the lack of resistant potato varieties.
To bolster current research and to shore up areas where more study is needed, these scientists met Oct. 7 and Oct. 8 to form the Cornell-Eastern Europe-Mexico (CEEM) International Collaborative Project in Potato Late Blight Control. A formal report of the meeting will be released Nov. 1.
So that redundant research is minimized around the world, the group agreed to use this forum as a scientific complement to the United States' national program combating potato and tomato late blight, which is scheduled to run through the year 2000. Further, CEEM will complement the Global Initiative on Late Blight Management currently directed by the International Potato Center in Lima, Peru; and the International Cooperative Potato Late Blight Program based in Mexico.
The total cost for this project will be $3.35 million over six years. So far CEEM has obtained about $2.3 million of the necessary funding and the project is managed by an international panel.
"Late blight is still the potato crop's most devastating disease," said K.V. Raman, professor of plant breeding and biometry and executive director of CEEM. "Most scientists agree that the new forms of the fungus could lead to catastrophic losses and require even larger applications of chemical fungicides in the future."
A report following the initial CEEM meeting explained that many potato-growing areas around the world are reporting the severity of P. infestans. The report indicated that current prevention and control measures are becoming more costly and more difficult and that many of the fungus' strains have become resistant to metalaxyl, a curative systemic fungicide.
One of the biggest threats is in Russia, compounded by one the world's age-old problems: lack of money. The scientists in attendance learned firsthand that one of the world's greatest repositories for potato germplasm -- the Vavilov Institute in St. Petersburg -- may be in danger of closing and that many of the samples of potato germplasm may be permanently lost, due to the institute's problems in paying its utility bills.
At the meeting, the world's top potato scientists agreed that CEEM would provide training sessions for scientists to learn the latest in technology. It also would serve as a communication hub to facilitate sharing biological materials and technology, and would have a research component, which would shuttle information among the scientists.
More than 1 million people died in Ireland as a result of a potato famine in the 1840s. Scientists believe that the indigenous strain of the fungus originated in Mexico and traveled to Ireland early in that decade. Sometime during the 1970s, another potato shipment carrying the fungus made its way from Mexico to Europe, bringing exotic strains of P. infestans. Scientists agree that the new strains are far more aggressive than the original outbreak 150 years ago.