Pierre-Marc Delaux, one of the ENSA project leaders, has received the prestigious Adam Kondorosi Academia Europaea Award for Early-Career Investigators. This award is a recognition of his exceptional contributions to the fields of nitrogen fixation, plant biology, and microbiology related to symbiosis.
The centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) research director, Pierre-Marc, from the University of Toulouse was chosen by the committee due to his significant impact on the study of symbiotic interactions in plants. His work spans from investigating the oldest known symbiosis, the arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis, to exploring the more recently evolved nitrogen-fixing root nodule symbiosis.
Upon receiving the award, Pierre-Marc expressed his gratitude, saying, “I am deeply honoured and very proud to receive this award. Not only does it validate the work we have been conducting for the last 15 years, but I also see it as a sign that evolutionary thinking is now considered a valid approach to tackling the big questions in our field. This award represents a collective success, from the students and postdocs in my lab to my mentors and our many collaborators, with of course a special mention to the ENSA consortium! Now, I hope we will be able to translate our basic-science discoveries into novel symbioses for agriculture.”