Monitoring and Innovative Diagnostics: How Research in the PestSpace Project Supports Faba Bean Crop Protection

In the latest article published in Przedsiębiorca Rolny magazine (04/2026 issue), scientists representing the Polish partners of the PestSpace project – Prof. Małgorzata Jędryczka and Joanna Kaczmarek, Ph.D. from the Institute of Plant Genetics of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Poznań – outline the challenges related to the health of this crop and the directions of modern diagnostics development.

Why is Continuous Faba Bean Monitoring So Crucial?

Faba bean is gaining importance as a valuable source of local protein and a plant that improves soil structure. However, due to an extensive list of threatening pathogens, a lack of regular monitoring can lead to significant yield losses – ranging from a few to several dozen percent.

Symptoms of many diseases can be deceptively similar, making accurate diagnosis in field conditions challenging:

• Chocolate Spot (Botrytis fabae) – causes brown spots on leaves and flowers, potentially reducing yield by up to 30-50%.
• Leaf Spot / Ascochyta Blight (Didymella fabae) – manifests as greyish-brown spots containing pycnidia.
• Alternaria Blight (Alternaria alternata) – attacks in the second half of the season, forming characteristic concentric rings on leaves.
• Faba Bean Rust (Uromyces viciae-fabae) and Downy Mildew (Peronospora viciae) – reduce assimilation area and weaken plant growth.
• Foot and Root Rots (Fusarium spp.) – damage the root system and the stem base.

Regular field scouting allows growers to notice the first spots early and make timely protection decisions before the disease spreads throughout the entire field.

Our Research and the PestSpace Project: A Digital Revolution in Diagnostics

The answer to field diagnostic challenges lies in the research conducted within the international PestSpace project, implemented in the Baltic Sea region under the leadership of the University of Tartu (Estonia). Teams from Estonia, Poland, Latvia, and Finland are participating in the initiative.

Poland is represented in this project by three renowned institutions:

• Institute of Plant Genetics,
• Polish Academy of Sciences in Poznań,
• University of Warsaw,
• Smolice Plant Breeding.

Faba Bean as a Model

PlantFaba bean was selected as our flagship test plant in the PestSpace project. It serves as the basis for our detailed observations and diagnostic data collection.

The research integrates: Molecular analyses of pathogens, Photographic documentation of field symptoms collected from experimental plots and commercial fields, Artificial Intelligence (AI) algorithms and machine learning. The outcome of our research will be an innovative mobile application, with its launch scheduled for February 2028. Thanks to the data gathered from our faba bean tests, this tool will enable farmers to instantly identify diseases based on a photo and facilitate precise crop protection decision-making.

Source article: M. Jędryczka, J. Kaczmarek, “Choroby bobiku. Klasyczne i nowoczesne metody detekcji i identyfikacji” [Faba bean diseases: Classic and modern detection and identification methods], Przedsiębiorca Rolny, no. 4 (136), April 2026, pp. 63–65.

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