Conference: FASEB 2024 Conference on Genetic Recombination and Genome Rearrangements

This award is for support of the conference Genetic Recombination and Genome Rearrangements, to be held July 14-19 2024 in Tucson, Arizona. This is a well-established conference that has occurred biennially since 1985. The meeting will include 8 plenary sessions, each of which will have 5 to 8 20 minute presentations. Approximately two-thirds of the speakers are by invitation, and the remainder will be selected from contributed abstracts, with an emphasis on early career scientists. In addition, approximately 70 junior participants giving posters will also be giving short Poster Primer talks, introducing themselves and their poster topics. This meeting will have over 200 participants representing all career stages, from trainees to established PI’s. The organizing committee will make a special effort to provide plenary speaking opportunities to diverse junior scientists as well. Notably, all NSF funds will be used to support participation by trainees and young investigators, with an emphasis on those from historically underrepresented groups as well as those with financial need. The conference will focus on the topic of recombination and its implications for genome rearrangement, mutation, DNA repair and chromosome function. These topics will be explored from multiple, mechanistic perspectives, including structural and biophysical analyses of the proteins involved in recombination, and genomic analyses of the consequences of recombination for genome structure. The meeting will emphasize breakthroughs spurred by cutting-edge approaches using molecular genetics, biochemistry and structural biology, as applied to DNA damage responses, chromatin remodeling, and the general processes of replication, transcription and recombination. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.