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Highlights and Facts
This conference followed on the First International RHIZOSPHERE Conference, which took place in Munich (Germany) in 2004 and gathered about 480 participants from worldwide to celebrate the centenary of the rhizosphere concept. With RHIZOSPHERE 2, the challenge was to gather an enlarged scientific audience, more open to developing countries while maintaining the high scientific standard of RHIZOSPHERE 2004, in order to warrant the launching of this new series of international conferences, at the interface between many disciplines. This was successfully achieved as more than 570 participants from 48 countries attended RHIZOSPHERE 2 from 26 to 31 August 2007 at Le Corum, Palais des Congrès de Montpellier. Compared with Munich in 2004, 24 % of the participants were coming from Africa, Central and South America and Asia (11% in Munich), partly as a result of the policy to encourage students and younger scientists from developing countries to attend, via grants which were awarded to 23 of them (full coverage of travel, on site costs and registration fees).
Distribution of participants per country
In total 576 abstracts were submitted distributing among the 17
thematic sessions amongst which the largest were the following (number
of abstracts in brackets) : Symbioses and plant growth promotion
(110), Functional and structural diversity (56 -bacteria + 26 -fungi
and fauna),
The format of the conference followed that of RHIZOSPHERE 2004,
the so-called ‘Toni’s Model’, walking in the footsteps
of Anton Hartmann, his dedication warranting the success of Munich
Conference. In total 19 invited conferences, including 12 plenary
lectures, were given, as well as 84
Poster awards
Beyond its scientific success, RHIZOSPHERE 2 was also marked by several highlights of its social programme :
The Gala Dinner on Thursday 30 August was organised in a magic and unique venue, the Valmagne Abbey at Villeveyrac (Hérault). For this special occasion, the so-called « Cathédrale des Vignes » which means « Cathedral of the Vineyards », its magnificent cloister and church enclosing enormous wine barrels was beautifully set by the Chef Germain Traiteur, who managed again to astonish the senses of the 520+ participants. This unique evening was punctuated by beautiful pieces of classical music played by the « Quintette de Cuivre (Brass) de l’Orchestre National de Montpellier », adding a final touch of class to this Gala Dinner.
The organisation of RHIZOSPHERE 2 was based on an efficient International Steering Committte chaired by Davey Jones (Univ. Bangor, Wales) and composed of 14 well-recognized European scientists and on a dedicated local organising committee which mobilised numerous French research and higher education institutions beside INRA : CIRAD, CNRS, IRD, SupAgro Montpellier and Université Montpellier 2, with the commitment of several labs of the large Montpellier campus : UMR BSR, B&PMP, CEFE, LSTM and UR SeqBio. The local organising committee was chaired by Philippe Hinsinger (INRA-SupAgro UMR Biogéochimie du Sol et de la Rhizosphère), while Sophie Pirkin was in charge of the administrative coordination.
Professor Hans Lambers (University of Western Australia), Editor
in Chef of the journal Plant and Soil and Chair of the organising
committee of the forthcoming Conference in this new series, Three special issues of international, refereed journals are currently
prepared, which will ultimately gather a selection of papers presented
at RHIZOSPHERE 2 : |
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Directeur
de la publication : Philippe Hinsinger - Coord. admin. : Sophie
Pirkin Conception / administration : Sébastien Lamy (coll. Corinne Dasen, Magalie Collet) - Graphisme : Georges LLambrich Copyright © INRA 2006 | Crédits | Mentions légales | Mise à jour : 09 janvier 2008 |
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Rhizoremediation and soil pollution (65), Fate and management
of nutrients (59), Root growth and plant functional diversity (48),
Cutting edge approaches/methodologies (41), Biological control and
plant health management (35). Compared with RHIZOSPHERE 2004 in Munich
where biodiversity gathered about 150 abstracts, and other issues
such as plant growth promotion, root growth and development, plant
nutrition and pollution/bioremediation were rather small, the distribution
of abstracts has thus been fairly different, illustrating the dynamics
of the rhizosphere scientific community. Another big surprise was
the decreasing importance of rhizosphere « classics » such
as plant health and molecular communication. Finally, in spite of
the rather small number of abstracts, the physical interactions session
gathered a rather huge audience for a parallel session. 
volunteered oral communications,
including 24 in plenary sessions. The selection pressure was rather
large as 250 authors had expressed the wish to present and oral communication.
The high standard of the talks was underlined by the many participants
and record audience in spite of the nice weather and terraces in
the vicinity of the venue. Besides the talks, about 330 posters were
presented during 3 separate poster sessions. Poster awards were offered
by three sponsors. The poster award recipients were the following :
The
Welcome Cocktail in the Hall of Le Corum on Sunday 26 August in the
evening, proudly sponsored by Roullier Group, was entertained
by Amaïsoul jazz band and was a display of some of the most
innovative French cuisine, thanks to the creativity of Germain Traiteur,
Montpellier.
A more limited number of delegates (about 150 in total) also attended
one of the 6 field scientific excursions organised around Montpellier
on Wednesday 29 August afternoon. This was a unique opportunity to
visit experimental sites linked with the issues addressed at the
Conference, as well as highlights of the local culture and the unique
landscapes of the Languedoc region, its fine wines and cuisine.
RHIZOSPHERE
3 to be held in September 2011 at Perth, Australia, stressed as follows
the succes of this scientific event in Montpellier : « I
am writing to congratulate you with a fantastic meeting. It
was clearly one of the best I have ever attended. Of course
there were the usual problems wanting to attend competing talks,
but that is no reflecting on the organisers - it is simply inevitable. Well
done! I do hope people will have forgotten what a great job
you and your team have done four years down the track. »