Plant-Microbe Symbiosis

Both soil and air teem with microbes, many of which affect plant growth and health through symbiotic relationships ranging from the clearly beneficial, e.g. mycorrhizas and rhizobial infections that supplement plant nutrition, to the clearly harmful, e.g. pathogenic infections that reduce crop yield or destroy forests. Modern molecular approaches make it possible not only to identify all the organisms that comprise complex microbial communities but to understand their interactions with plants. Researchers with expertise in different symbiotic systems were able to share such knowledge at the First New Phytologist Symposium held in York, November 1995. The collected papers illustrate the molecular techniques available now and describe those being developed for the future. They present up-to-the-minute information in a style that makes it accessible to final year students and postgraduates as well as to those actively involved in researching symbiosis.