Sarah Gurr

Oxford University, UK

Sarah Gurr is Professor of Molecular Plant Pathology at Oxford University and Fellow of Somerville College. She is President of the British Society for Plant Pathology (2009-2010). Her work is funded by UK Research Councils, Charities and by AgChem / Biotech. Industries. She has authored / co-written 97 research papers, reviews, chapters; edited 2 books and holds 5 patents. Her research goal is to pinpoint new targets for the control of fungal disease by unmasking the earliest of events between host and pathogen, which trigger infection. She will discuss global food security, with special reference to the most notable pathogen of rice - the persistent and destructive rice blast fungus Magnaporthe oryzae¹.

¹ Skamnioti, P and Gurr, SJ (2009) Against the grain: safe-guarding rice from rice blast disease. Trends in Biotechnology 27 3 141-150