Jen McGaley wins award for innovative mycorrhizal research at ICOM 2024

Jen McGaley, from the Cereal Symbiosis Group at the Crop Science Centre, has been awarded the ‘Best Paper in Applied Agricultural Mycorrhizal Research’ at the International Conference on Mycorrhiza 2024 (ICOM). This recognition highlights Jen’s work in advancing our understanding of arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) symbiosis, a vital interaction between plants and fungi with significant implications for global agriculture.

McGaley’s award-winning research introduces the AMSlide, an innovative, noninvasive, high-resolution live-imaging system specifically designed for AM symbiosis studies. The AMSlide addresses a critical challenge in the field: capturing the dynamic, spatiotemporal processes of mycorrhizal interactions within plant roots. Traditional microscopy methods have successfully explored the spatial aspects of this relationship, but understanding its temporal evolution has remained elusive due to the difficulties in maintaining both plant and fungal partners undisturbed over extended periods

The AMSlide offers a solution, enabling researchers to observe mycorrhizal colonization and subcellular structures in unprecedented detail over timeframes ranging from minutes to weeks. Its versatility allows it to be used with various microscope setups, imaging techniques, and plant and fungal species, making it a powerful tool for a wide range of applications in AM symbiosis research.

This approach not only fills in critical gaps in our understanding of AM symbiosis but also opens new avenues for exploring broader root and rhizosphere processes. The AMSlide’s potential to enhance agricultural practices by deepening our understanding of these fundamental interactions underscores the importance of McGaley’s contribution to the field.

A link to the research, which is published in the Journal of Microscopy, can be found here https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jmi.13313

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