Current members of the team

Dr Maël Baudin, Postdoctoral fellow INRAE

As a PhD student, I focused on legume-rhyzobium symbiosis in the Laboratory of Plant-Microbe Interactions in Toulouse (France). After graduating in 2014, I joined the group of Jennifer Lewis in UC Berkeley (USA) to work on the characterization of ZAR1-mediated immunity against the bacterial pathogen P. syringae. In 2021 I obtained a Marie Skłodowska-Curie individual fellowship to work on M. oryzae effectors in the group of Thomas Kroj in Montpellier (France)

My authored publications via Google schoolar

Alexandra Boultif, Undergraduate student

François Brinisholz, Master student

Dr Stella Cesari, CRCN INRAE

I studied Plant Biology at the University of Montpellier and obtained my PhD in 2012 in plant-pathogen interactions. My work focused on the mechanisms involved in the recognition of rice-blast effectors by rice immune receptors. Then, I joined CSIRO (Australia), where I studied the signalling activity of rust resistance proteins in wheat. In 2018, I obtained a scientist position at INRAe to study the molecular basis of plant defence and pathogen virulence mechanisms.

My authored publications via ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8558-0371

My website: https://stellacesari.com

Véronique Chalvon Poulier, Technical Assistant, INRAE

Dr Thomas Kroj, HDR, DR2 INRAE (group leader)

I studied chemistry at the University of Cologne (Germany) and obtained my PhD in 1999 from the University of Halle (Germany). During my master and PhD thesis, I worked on plant immune signaling, first at the Max Planck Institute of Plant Breeding Research in Cologne and later at the Institute of Plant Biochemistry in Halle. I than moved as a post-doc to the Institut des Sciences du Végétal in Gif-sur-Yvette (France) where I studied the transcriptional regulation of seed maturation in Arabidopsis thaliana. In 2001, I was recruited as a researcher at INRAE to develop at the Laboratory of Plant-Microbe Interactions in Toulouse research on the molecular bases of immunity in A. thaliana and its interaction with the pathogenic bacteria Pseudomonas syringae and Xanthomonas campestris. In 2007, I moved to the Biology and Genetics of Plant-Pathogen Interaction Laboratory in Montpellier where I joined the rice blast team to study the molecular mechanisms of virulence in the blast fungus Magnaporthe oryzae and of resistance to blast disease in rice. Since 2019, I am leading the CIME research team that is since 2021 part of the Plant Health Institute Montpellier.

My authored publications via ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3752-1788

Nutthalak Laksanavilat, PhD Student

During my BSc degree in Biology at Kasetsart University (Thailand), I had the opportunity to work in plant-microbe interactions field at the Sainsbury Laboratory in Norwich (UK) as an intern in 2017. After obtaining my BSc degree, I continued my study in Master of Plant Sciences at University Paris Saclay in Paris (France) under Franco-Thai scholarship. In 2020, I obtained the same grant from the French government to pursue my PhD on the mechanisms involved in the recognition of M. oryzae effectors by rice immune receptors at the Plant Health Institute of Montpellier (France) in the CIME team under the supervision of Thomas Kroj, Stella Cesari and Karine Lambou.

Dr Karine Lambou, Lecturer, University of Montpellier

I’m a microbiologist who has worked on pathogen model microorganisms (prokaryotes and eukaryotes) using genome-wide approaches to unravel fundamental or or applied questions. In Dr Marc-Henri Lebrun’s laboratory (UMR CNRS/Bayer CropScience, Lyon), I studied the tetraspanin role in the fungal pathogen of rice Magnaporthe oryzae and in Podospora anserina. I joined the Pasteur Institute (Unité des Aspergillus, Paris) to investigate the superoxyde dismutases function and the betaine glycine biosynthesis in the human fungal pathogen Aspergillus fumigatus. In 2011, I obtained a lecturer position at the University of Montpellier to teach mycology and I continued to work on pathogen models such as Meloydogyne incognita and Coxiella burnetii. In 2020, I joined the Dr Thomas Kroj’s team (UMR PHIM) to study the M. oryzae virulence mechanisms.

My authored publication via https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5558-6860

Marie Le Naour--Vernet, PhD Student Montpellier SupAgro

After studying cellular and molecular biology at the University of Lille for my Bsc, I continued my studies at the University of Montpellier where I focused on plant functional biology and obtained my Master's degree in 2019. During this degree, I had the opportunity to specialize in Plant-microbe interactions. This led me to work on Phythophtora palmivora at the Sainsburry Laboratory in Cambridge (UK) and on Magnaporthe oryzae MAX effectors at the Plant Health Institute of Montpellier (France). Particularly interested in effector studies, I obtained a PhD grant from the french government to pursue my work on MAX effectors in the CIME lab under the supervision of Thomas Kroj.

My authored publications via ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4923-8039

Dr Isabelle Meusnier, Engineer INRAE

Dr Sébastien Ribeiro, Postdoctoral fellow INRAE

In 2019, I obtained my PhD on plant-pathogen interactions in the laboratory of Integrative Physics and Physiology of Trees in Fluctuating Environments (UMR PIAF, Clermont-Ferrand, France), in association with the CIRAD (Montpellier, France). My thesis focused on the role of a fungal toxin effector, the cassiicolin Cas1, in the compatible interaction between the rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis) and the necrotrophic fungus Corynespora cassiicola. Then, I worked as a postdoctoral researcher on the Gemm_Est project at SILVA laboratory (Nancy, France). The key objective was to gather scientific and technological information, to determine whether resin tapping could be re-established in the Grand East region. Now, I’m working on Magnaporthe oryzae MAX effectors at the Plant Health Institute Montpellier (Montpellier, France) in the CIME team, with Stella Cesari.

My authored publications via ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3233-2646

Céline Thivolle, Technical Assistant, INRAE

Yuxuan Xi, PhD Student

I studied Plant Protection in Nanjing Agricultural University (China) from 2012-2016 for my bachelor’s degree. In 2016, I joined Junfeng Liu’s group in China Agricultural University (China) for my master’s degree using crystallization method to investigate the interaction mechanisms between the pathogens and hosts. In 2018, I got scholarship from China Scholarship Council and joined Thomas Kroj’s group in Plant Health Institute Montpellier (France) to pursue a ph.D focusing on molecular mechanisms of effector recognition by paired NLR immune receptors RGA4/RGA5 from rice.

My authored publications via ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1568-229X