Nitrogen availability is one of the most critical factors that limits plant productivity. The largest reservoir of nitrogen is the atmosphere, but this gaseous molecular nitrogen only becomes available to plants through the biological nitrogen fixation process, which only prokaryotic cells have developed. The discovery that microbes were providing fixed nitrogen to legumes and the isolation of the first nitrogen-fixing bacteria occured at the end the 19th Century, in Louis Pasteur's time. We are now building on more than 100 years of research in this field and looking towards the 21st Century. The International Nitrogen Fixation Congress series Started more than 20 years ago. The format of this Congress is designed to gather scientists from very diverse origins, backgrounds, interests and scientific approaches and is a forum where fundamental knowledge is discussed alongside applied research. This confluence of perspectives is, we believe, extremely beneficial in raising new ideas, questions and concepts.

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Section I. Chemistry and Biochemistry. Section II. Genetics and Regulation. Genetics and Regulation of Nitrogen Fixation. Cyanobacteria and Photosynthetic Bacteria. Section III. Symbioses and Associations. Rhizobium-Legume Symbiosis. Plant Genetics and Symbiotic Genes. Actinorhizal Symbiosis. Associations with Grasses. Section IV. Environmental and Physiological Factors Controlling Nitrogen Fixation. Carbon Metabolism. Environmental Stress. Section V. Genome Structure, Taxonomy and Ecology. Section VI. Sustainable Agriculture and Forestry. Prospects in Agriculture. Sustainable Agriculture. Forestry. Section VII. Prospects for the 21st Century. Author Index.