Highlights of the 18th Meeting of the International Council for the Study of Virus and Virus Like Diseases of the Grapevine

T H E 1 8 T H M E E T I N G O F The International Council for the Study of Virus and Virus Like Diseases of the Grapevine (ICVG) was held in Ankara, Turkey, September 7-11, 2015. The ICVG meeting is held once every three years to promote collaboration and interaction among pathologists who specialize in viruses, viroids and phytoplasmas that infect grapevines. The next meeting will be held in 2018 in Chile. The meeting in Ankara was well attended with more than 109 scientific presentations from different grape-growing areas across the world. The two field visits were of interest because Turkey is one of the main genetic and domestication centers of the wild Eurasian grapevine Vitis sylvestris. Furthermore, biodiversity of the cultivated form Vitis vinifera is found in this country. The delegates visited the Ankara University Agriculture vineyard to learn about genetic diversity, planting selections and local disease issues. The second vineyard visit was held near Cappadocia, a region thought to be the site where the oldest vineyards in the world are found. Drs. Feliz Ertunc and Birham Marasali provided informative presentations on the Turkish viticulture and wine industry. There were many interesting sessions in which a broad range of research was presented. The complete articles can be found by searching the author’s name in the meeting abstract book, found at http://icvg2015.org/data/ icvg_2015_abstract_book.pdf. Here, we refer to a number of novel achievements discussed at the meeting.