Helicases: Structure, Function, & Roles in Human Disease

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This application is for partial funding for the 2001 FASEB Summer Conference on "Helicases: Structure, Function and Roles in Human Disease" to be held on July 7-12, 2001 at the Vermont Academy in Saxtons River, Vermont. The conference will be held under the auspices of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB). There will be nine major scientific sessions, each session including, on average, five 30 minute oral presentations. There will be two poster sessions, each lasting two days. Helicases play essential roles in a wide range of important biological processes including DNA replication, repair, recombination, transcription, splicing and translation. In addition, it has recently been shown that several inherited human diseases (e.g. Bloom syndrome, Werner syndrome, Cockayne syndrome and Xeroderma pigmentosum) are caused by mutations in specific helicases. Thus, defects in genes encoding helicases are associated with genomic instability, an increased incidence of cancer, and the molecular biology of aging. The topics to be included for discussion are: helicase structure; helicase function and mechanism; DNA helicases in DNA replication, DNA helicases in DNA repair and recombination, RNA helicases in transcription, splicing, RNA stability and transport, RNA helicases in translation and ribosome hiegenesis; helicases as part of macromolecular machines; helicases in vital replication; and helicases in cancer and aging. The meeting will consider both RNA and DNA helicases from sources ranging from viruses and bacteria to eukaryotic cells including human helicases. The goal of this meeting is to bring together biochemists, structural biologists, geneticists and those with a more clinical view to share information. This field is an extremely rapid pace with new information on mechanism, structure and the role of helicases in human disease reported on a weekly basis. This is the first FASEB conference on this subject; in fact, it is the first meeting devoted exclusively to helicases to be held in this country.