Conference: 24th Annual Crown Gall Conference, to be held at Cornell University, Noveember 22-23, 2003

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Funding is requested to help offset travel expenses for undergraduate and graduatestudents attending the 24th Annual Crown Gall Conference. This conference will take placeNovember 22-23, 2003 at Cornell University, and will be attended by approximately 75national and international scientists that study Agrobacterium tumefaciens. Of these,approximately half will be students working in US labs, who will be the sole beneficiariesof financial assistance from NSF. Several of these students study at undergraduatecolleges, and their advisors do not have adequate funding for travel of this sort.Studies of A. tumefaciens continue to provide an ongoing intellectual feast. Thisorganism is one of the best developed model pathogens available. It provided the firstmodel for translocation of macromolecules from pathogen to host, a phenomenon that is nowknown to be quite widespread. The A. tumefaciens transfer system continues to be the bestcharacterized member of its family. This bacterium provided the first model for thedetection of host-released diffusible chemical signals, and this system continues to leadthe way in host detection. This organism has also provided an excellent model for thephenomenon of cell-cell communication, a phenomenon sometimes referred to as quorumsensing. Students of A. tumefaciens will continue to provide leadership in fundamentalaspects of host-microbe interactions. This conference therefore focuses on an importantmodel patho-system.These studies also impact the scientific infrastructure in many ways. One area has to dowith the creation of transgenic plants. Although A. tumefaciens is routinely used tointroduce transgenes into many species of plants, there is a great deal of room forimprovement, particularly in transformation of monocots, the introduction of extremelylong T-DNAs, in the regeneration of plants from transformed cells, and in the removal ofantibiotic resistance markers from transgenic crops. The fundamental studies presentingin this conference will surely impact upon plant molecular genetics and agriculture.A. tumefaciens also provides an excellent model for learning how to do good science. Theorganism is readily culturable and readily manipulated genetically. Therefore, thisorganism and its hosts provide many opportunities for learning how to do highlycontrolled, reproducible, hypothesis-based experiments. In short, students of A.tumefaciens learn how to be good scientists, and will carry these skills with themthroughout their scientific careers.