Last July 12 took place the defense of the doctoral thesis of Ms. Nuria Estiarte Piñol, which was entitled "Alternaria spp. and their mycotoxins in tomatoes. A scientific approach from field to food industry", co-directed by Dr. Antonio J. Ramos, from the UdL, and Dra. Ana Crespo-Sempere, from the company Valgenetics SL

The thesis has addressed the problem of mycotoxin contamination of tomato and its derivatives by Alternaria, studying the presence of viable species of Alternaria and two of their mycotoxins (alternariol and alternariol monomethyl ether) in samples of Catalonia. The results showed the presence of Alternaria in fresh tomatoes for production of tomato derivatives, as well as the presence of the two toxins studied throughout the industrial processing, although the levels of both toxins decreased generally as advancing the process. In addition, the thesis studied the problem from a more global perspective, from field to table. Velvet protein family (VeA and Laea) were studied and, in turn, it was investigated the metabolism of polyamines in Alternaria alternata, with the aim of finding useful targets for the design of new fungicides. In a post-harvest context, the effects of 1-methylcyclopropene (1-MCP) in fungal growth and toxin production by A. alternata was analyzed and it was found that Alternaria infection was higher in those tomatoes treated with 1-MCP, but this treatment did not affect the production of toxins in two of the three tomato varieties used. Finally, the stability alternariol and alternariol monomethyl ether was studied during the manufacturing process of tomato