Conference: 2012 Plant and Microbial Cytoskeleton Gordon Research Conference being held August 12-17, 2012 in Andover, NH

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Intellectual MeritResearch to be presented at this conference employs a diverse collection of organisms and experimental approaches, and is thus highly interdisciplinary. The following two objectives exemplifying the intellectual merit of the conference will be accomplished:1. Communicate to all conference participants the most exciting advances in understanding the regulation of cytoskeletal structure, dynamics, organization and function in plants, fungi, bacteria and other microbes. This will be accomplished primarily via 31 full length talks given by invited speakers, approximately 15 short talks invited based on submitted abstracts, and poster presentations given by most other conference participants. Discussions among participants after each talk and during poster sessions, meals, and free time will also play a key role in communicating advances, and stimulating ideas for future projects and collaborations.2. Promote understanding of, and stimulate interest in mathematical, biophysical and computational approaches to understanding cytoskeletal regulation and function. Two new areas of emphasis for the 2012 conference program were chosen to accomplish this goal: use of mathematical/biophysical modeling, and use of computational methods to achieve single molecule resolution in fluorescence imaging of cytoskeletal and cytoskeleton-interacting proteins. Seven full length invited talks will illustrate use of these approaches to study the cytoskeleton, and it is anticipated that short talk speakers employing these approaches will also be chosen.Broader Impacts The Chair and Vice Chair are fully committed to the goal of broadening participation in this conference and the scientific community it represents. To this end, they will pursue the following two objectives:3. Provide career building opportunities for young scientists attending this conference. Eight of 31 invited speakers are within the first six years of their first faculty position and untenured. Most of the 15 short talk speakers will be early career faculty, postdocs or Ph.D. students, and virtually all other meeting participants will present a poster on their research. The small size and highly interactive nature of this conference will facilitate the ability of young scientists to interact with more established ones. Thus, young scientists attending this conference will have excellent career-building opportunities.4. Broaden participation in this conference. The majority of invited speakers have never previously spoken at this conference. The conference has been advertised widely to stimulate interest from individuals who have not previously attended. To further broaden participation, NSF-funded awards will be made to students, postdocs and early career faculty who might not otherwise be able to attend for financial reasons or who might not even have considered attending, with priority given to women and URMs.