Nick Talbot Group
Research in the Nick Talbot group involves the understanding of how fungi are able to cause disease in plants, specifically one of the world’s most devastating diseases called rice blast.
Our Research
We are interested in understanding how fungi are able to invade plants using specialised infection structures called appressoria, how plant tissue is invaded, and how fungi suppress plant immunity.
In particular, we investigate how the rice blast fungus Magnaporthe oryzae infects plants. Rice blast disease destroys up to a third of the annual global rice harvest – enough rice to feed 60 million people.
