The 2012 Gordon Conference on Muscle: Excitation/Contraction Coupling will present results of the latest research on the intricate processes that link excitation to contraction in skeletal and cardiac muscle as well as the disorders that result from their malfunction. The conference will emphasize the many multi-disciplinary approaches used to study this process, including structural biology, electron microscopy, biochemistry, biophysics, molecular genetics, cell physiology, and animal studies.

Invited speakers will discuss and evaluate critically new findings on (1) the structure of the molecular machinery underlying excitation-contraction coupling, (2) the rapid calcium signaling important for excitation-contraction coupling as well as the slower calcium signals that are important for regulating other processes in striated muscle, (3) the effects of human disease-causing mutations, fatigue and aging on excitation-contraction coupling (4) the roles of both the primary players and the accessory proteins of the triad junction in excitation-contraction coupling, (5) the role of calcium signaling in adaptation, and disease progression, and (6) the development and implementation of new methods to probe muscle excitation-contraction coupling and signaling.

In addition to the invited speakers, the organizing committee will select several poster presenters to give short talks during the formal sessions. The conference will stimulate discussions and will provide a forum that will give young and established investigators the opportunity to meet and interact and exchange their opinions on various topics of the meeting. By bridging basic science, translational and clinical studies related to the mechanism of muscle diseases, this meeting will foster new research directions and scientific collaborations moving the field forward into the future.