Biological Invasions: general concepts and glossary; concept of introduction, naturalization; acclimatization and invasion; examples of biological invasions; factors associated to risk of introduction. Invasive Forest Pathogens: dimension of the problem. Introduction to pathways: living plants trade; timber trade; seed and propagation material trade; unregulated pathways: wood manufactured products; examples. Strategies of invasions: host jump; hybridization; differential evolution. Impacts: economic; on biodiversity; on carbon dioxide fixation; on cultural heritage; examples. Phytosanitary regulations: ICPP, SPS agreement, NPPO, Phytosanitary services; EPPO products, quarantine organisms lists; EPPO standards; Pest Risk Analysis. Invasive Forest Pathogens: European situation; vulnerability of EU countries to invasion. Pest Risk Analysis: concepts and examples. Constraints of the Phytosanitary regulations; possible solutions: search of centers of origin; the sentinel tree strategy. Introduction to diagnostic. Serological diagnostics: polyclonal and monoclonal antibodies; the antigen; the ELISA test; molecular methods: PCR; the concept of markers; characteristics of markers for molecular diagnostics; general and specific primer sets; practical application. Molecular diagnostic: multiplex and nested conventional PCR; quantitative PCR, TaqMan and SYBR Green technologies; examples of application; proof of the vitality of the pathogen: mRNA as a template; the dqRT-PCR approach; the HTS approach; the use of EPPO diagnostic standards. Phytosanitary forest monitoring: introduction; proximal and remote sensing activities, advantages and disadvantages. Phytosanitary monitoring in European countries (the example of France) and Italy. Phytosanitary monitoring: ICP forests monitoring in Europe: Levels 1 and 2. Plant Viruses: structure, cycle, vectors, epidemiology, symptomatology, diagnosis, and control; examples of viral diseases Introduction to Phytoplasmas and Spyroplasmas: disease cycle, vectors, symptomatology, epidemiology, detection & diagnosis; taxonomy; an example of Phytoplasmas and Spiroplasmas diseases. Introduction to Bacteria: morphology, biology, ecology, symptomatology, phytopathogenic bacteria; diagnosis and taxonomy; an example of bacterial diseases. Oomycetes: taxonomic context; morphology, biology, epidemiology; an example of Phytophthora diseases. Laboratory practical work on specimens collection; binocular observation; microscopic observation; application of identification keys; isolation from samples onto growing media. DNA extraction from fungal cultures; separation on agarose gel and observation; sample preparation for PCR reaction; PCR amplification and run of agarose gel for amplicons separation; Sequence analysis and BLAST on GeneBank.

Teacher PPT presentation; scientific papers; online software; web sites