Young researcher: Léna Dole

Léna Dole won the ISHS Young Minds Award for the best oral presentation at the XVII International Symposium on Processing Tomato, which was held in Budapest in June 2024 for her paper entitled: "Alternaria toxins: risk prevention and control for the tomato food chain". 

Léna Dole's academic background starts with two years of intensive post-A-level French classes, preparing for the competitive entrance exams for national engineering schools. After passing the competitive exams, she began her double master's studies at the National Institute of Agronomy and Food Science (National engineering school “Institute Agro Dijon”, France) and in food microbiology at the University of Burgundy, France. Currently, Léna is a PhD student at the University of Montpellier, France, under the supervision of Professor Sabine Schorr-Galindo.

Her research focuses on the contamination of tomato fruits by the mold Alternaria spp., which causes chemical contamination of tomato-based products by Alternaria toxins covered by the European recommendation 2022/553. The objective of her work is to anticipate potential future European regulation of Alternaria toxins in tomato products by better understanding the mechanisms of fruit infection, identifying critical points of contamination during tomato production and processing, and evaluating control solutions alternative to fungicides.

At the 17th ISHS symposium on processing tomato, Léna presented some of her results in a presentation entitled “Alternaria toxins: risk prevention and control for the tomato food chain.”

In summary, she showed that Alternaria alternata and Alternaria arborescens contaminate tomatoes in France and can produce several Alternaria toxins, notably tenuazonic acid in large amounts. By studying processing operations, she did not observe any degradation of toxins during thermal treatments, but solid residues from refining, which can be reused, were heavily contaminated, and concentration operations increased levels of tenuazonic acid proportionally to water evaporation. A plant extract and an antagonistic bacterial isolate showed promising antifungal activities against Alternaria alternata, but their effect on toxin production has not been tested yet.

The contents of this presentation will be published alongside other research work presented during the symposium in a special edition of Acta Horticulturae.