Summary of the 19th International Conference on Arabidopsis Research (July 23-27, 2008 in Montreal, Canada)

The 19th International Conference on Arabidopsis Research was a successful meeting attended by 815 scientists from around the world including 322 from the United States, 146 attendees from Canada, 179 from Europe, 134 from Asia, and 34 from a combination of Australia, South America, Africa and the Middle East. The scientific program was of excellent quality featuring 64 talks, including 41 from invited speakers. The Keynote Lecture, delivered by Chris Somerville (Energy Biosciences Institute/UC Berkeley) was particularly relevant to US agriculture and energy research and was titled The Development of Cellulosic Biofuels. There were also 6 community-organized workshops featuring 30 additional talks on topics including Frontiers in Plant Systems Biology, Sources and strategies for Gene Structure, Gene Function, and Metabolic Pathway annotation at TAIR and AraCyc, Advanced Bioinformatic Resources for Arabidopsis, Laser Microtechniques and Applications with Arabidopsis, Plant Proteomics- Tools, Approaches, Standards and Breakthroughs in Studying the Proteome, and Phytohormone Biosynthesis and Signal Transduction. Conference organizers arranged a special seminar by Jim Collins (head of the Directorate of Biosciences at NSF) to provide a community discussion forum regarding the future of Arabidopsis research. Approximately 575 posters were presented in topic areas including, among others, Development, Signal Transduction, Cell Walls, Non-Arabidopsis Systems, and Interactions with Biotic and Abiotic Factors. All conference abstracts and the full program are posted at The Arabidopsis Information Resource (TAIR), a publicly-accessibly website (www.arabidopsis.org/news/abstracts.jsp.) A survey completed by approximately 40% of the meeting attendees showed high satisfaction with the quality of the presentations, meeting organization and the city of Montreal. The conference is the largest annual international Arabidopsis venue which allowed the exchange of information at the forefront of Arabidopsis research and facilitated the establishment of new, and the strengthening of old, collaborations and networks. In addition, the conference provides the site for the annual meetings of the Multinational Arabidopsis Steering Committee (MASC) and the North American Arabidopsis Steering Committee (NAASC.) Graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, junior faculty, and underrepresented minorities made up half of the oral presentations thereby promoting the training of young scientists and facilitating important career development opportunities for speakers. Several poster sessions provided an opportunity for younger participants to freely meet with more established scientists. The NAASC continued its outreach efforts and again sponsored two special luncheons to encourage personal and professional development of young scientists and underrepresented minorities. The œEmerging Scientists Luncheon featured 8 graduate students selected on the basis of scientific excellence of their submitted research abstracts. Also attending were the Keynote Speaker and faculty conference organizers. The œMinority Funding Luncheon, featured 7 awardees (2 female graduate students, 2 female faculty, 2 male graduate students and 1 male faculty) selected by the NAASC through a widely-publicized application process. This luncheon was established specifically to provide an opportunity for underrepresented minorities, and/or scientists from Minority-Serving Institutions/Historically Black Colleges and Universities to network with NAASC members and representatives from federal funding agencies in an informal and intimate setting. This luncheon included introductions of each award recipient and discussion of outreach efforts and informal research and career discussions. Staff members from The Arabidopsis Information Resource (TAIR), the public U.S. Arabidopsis bioinformatics resource, led one workshop and participated in another to convey information to the community about Arabidopsis resources. Participation by young researchers was facilitated through DOE-sponsored registration awards to 10 early career applicants from the US including five graduate students, four postdoctoral scholars and one new assistant faculty member