From Meiotic Entry to Gamete Production

The Meiosis Gordon Research Conferences (GRC) to be held at Colby-Sawyer College in New London, NH on June 1-6, 2014. The GRC will be coupled with the Meiosis Gordon Research Seminar (GRS) held in the same location, immediately prior to the GRC (May 31 - June 1, 2014), and organized by graduate students and postdoctoral fellows, which offers an opportunity for junior researchers to network and discuss the topics that will be covered in more depth during the GRC. The long term goal of these conferences is to understand the fundamental mechanisms that ensure the stabile inheritance of the genome during meiotic cell divisions in both normal and disease conditions. The specific aims of the meetings are to: foster innovation, create networks between young and established investigators, rapidly disseminate new and unpublished results, and promote interdisciplinary synergies. The GRC will gather approximately 175 participants, including 53 speakers, to present and discuss cutting-edge, mostly unpublished research. The program comprises 9 plenary sessions that broadly address current issues in meiotic recombination, meiotic progression and cell cycle checkpoints, epigenetic control of meiotic processes, regulation of meiotic gene expression, chromosome pairing and synapsis, sister chromatid cohesion, chromosome interactions with the nuclear envelope, chromosome segregation, and the evolution and natural variation of meiotic processes. Four poster sessions, open to all participants throughout the conference will provide a basis for extended and in-depth critical discussions. The GRS will include between 50-60 participants and will have three plenary and two poster sessions.

Meiosis is a fundamental biological mechanism shared by all sexually reproducing species. Meiotic functions ensure fertility, generate natural variation and provide the mechanistic basis for the rules that govern inheritance. Given the universality of meiosis among sexually reproducing species, there is surprising variety in the molecular and cellular strategies employed by different organisms to achieve these ends. As a result, the meiosis community is equally diverse and the GRC/GRS integrates an array of scientific approaches including cell and developmental biology, modeling, genetics, evolutionary analysis and biochemistry executed in a variety of organisms such as fungi, protists, insects, plants and animals. In addition to advancing our understanding of a critical biological process the discoveries discussed at the meeting will have direct relevance to animal breeding, crop improvement and human health including human fertility, chromosomal aberrations such as Down Syndrome and cancer. This pair of conferences brings together graduate students, postdocs, young investigators and established PIs to push the leading edge of innovation and knowledge in this exciting and rapidly evolving area of biology.