Download Small meeting, maximum interaction

Small meeting, maximum interaction
ARVO/ISOCB meeting in Portugal
The relatively small size of the newly created ARVO International Society for Ocular Cell
Biology (ISOCB) meeting allowed for maximum interaction between attendees,
including the audience and speakers, at poster sessions and in informal venues
surrounding the meeting.
The meeting took place September 9-12, 2009,
at the Vila Galé Ericeira Hotel in Ericeira,
Portugal. Ericeira is a seaside fishing village
and resort area about 36 km northwest of
Lisbon.
This Gordon Conference-style meeting was
attended by approximately 140 researchers,
largely from Europe, North America and the
Pacific Rim. In contrast to the more traditional
tissue-based organization of platform and poster presentations common to ARVO
meetings, the format of this meeting was topic-driven.
Ten platform sessions (with 4–6 speakers each,
including invited speakers as well as those drawn
from the submitted abstracts) and four attendant
poster sessions were featured, covering a range of
topics pertinent to fundamental biological processes
as well as associated pathological conditions that
occur in retina, lens, and cornea.
The topics included:
• ocular gene expression
• channels
• signal transduction and membrane trafficking
• ocular development and regeneration
• inflammation and oxidative stress
• blood and lymphatic vasculature
• extracellular matrix and cell adhesion
• epithelial-mesenchymal transition and epithelial cell biology
• stem cells and cell-based therapies
• cytoskeleton.
In addition, there were four plenary lectures, three of which were given by prominent
scientists (two notably from outside the vision/ophthalmic science community) on topics
of general interest to ocular cell and molecular biologists. These included:
• Dirk Grimm, PhD (University of Heidelberg, Germany), who talked about RNAi
and gene therapy approaches;
• Alain Prochiantz, PhD (Collége de France, France), who addressed
homeoprotein-based signaling in nervous system development and plasticity;
and
• Vivek Malhotra, PhD (Center for Genomic Regulation, Spain), who spoke on the
role of TANGO1 in intracellular trafficking.
The fourth plenary lecture was given at the
conclusion of the meeting by Leonor Beleza,
LLB, president of the Champalimaud
Foundation (based in Lisbon, Portugal), who
talked about the partnering of this prominent
private philanthropic organization with
individual vision scientists as well as research
groups to support biomedical research and to
promote breakthroughs leading to preventions
and cures for blindness and visual impairment
world-wide.
The Program Organizing Committee for this meeting was led by Miguel Seabra, MD,
PhD (Imperial College London, UK, and Instituto Gulbenkian de Cience, Portugal) and
Steven J. Fliesler, PhD (University at Buffalo/State University of New York and the
Veterans Administration Western New York Healthcare System, US).
The committee included ISOCB co-founders John Greenwood, PhD, and Stephen
Moss, PhD (Institute of Ophthalmology, UK), as well as Melinda Duncan, PhD
(University of Delaware, US), and Nancy Joyce, PhD (Schepens Eye Research
Institute/Harvard Medical School, US).
The next ARVO ISOCB meeting will take place in mid- to late-2011, likely at a location
in northwestern North America.