2006 Visual System Development Gordon Conference

描述(由申请人提供)：戈登视觉系统发展研究会议(GRC)是一个两年一度的会议，利用无脊椎动物(主要是果蝇)和脊椎动物模型来研究眼睛和视觉系统的发育和进化。组织这次会议的一个重要推动力是1994年发表于瑞士巴塞尔的Walter Gehring实验室的一篇开创性论文，该论文表明，一种同源基因(Eyes/Pax6)分别指定苍蝇和脊椎动物的眼睛形成。在接下来的几年里，这次会议提供了一个令人兴奋的独特论坛，在这个论坛上探索脊椎动物和无脊椎动物视觉系统之间的相似之处和不同之处。GRC的目标是促进对在不同生物体中调节视觉系统的构建和功能的共同原则的欣赏，并分享最新的令人兴奋的新想法和概念。GRC会议的形式为交流思想和发展新的合作提供了一个高度互动和刺激的场所。对这一感觉系统的发展有着共同兴趣，但研究从苍蝇到哺乳动物的不同模型系统的科学家，几乎没有其他科学互动的机会，因为其他相关的专业会议要么聚焦于特定的有机体(例如，果蝇会议、斑马鱼会议)，要么聚焦于更广泛的领域(例如，神经科学学会、视觉和眼科学研究协会)。视觉系统开发GRC已经建立了其领域领先会议的声誉。之前的视觉系统开发会议都是在美国举行的，但2006年的会议将在意大利的GRC网站举行。这一会场为增加欧洲和亚洲科学家的参与提供了机会，这将拓宽和提高本次会议的多样性和质量。目前的提案要求提供资金，帮助支付美国科学家的旅费和会议费。在挑选发言者和讨论带头人时，对性别和族裔多样性以及将处于职业生涯不同阶段的科学家纳入其中给予了认真的关注，他们都有令人振奋的新工作要与同事分享。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The Gordon Research Conference (GRC) on Visual System Development is a biennial meeting that brings together investigators using invertebrate (primarily Drosophila) and vertebrate animal models to study the development and evolution of the eye and visual system. An important impetus for the organization of this meeting was a seminal paper from Walter Gehring's laboratory in Basel, Switzerland published in 1994, which showed that an orthologous gene (eyeless/Pax6) specifies eye formation in flies and vertebrates, respectively. Over the subsequent years, this meeting has provided an exciting and unique forum in which to explore the similarities - and differences - between vertebrate and invertebrate visual systems. The goal of this GRC is to foster an appreciation of common principles that mediate the construction and function of the visual system in diverse organisms and to share the latest exciting new ideas and concepts. The format of the GRC meetings provides a highly interactive and stimulating venue for cross-fertilization of ideas and for developing new collaborations. The scientists who share a common interest in the development of this sensory system, but who work on diverse model systems, from flies to mammals, have few other opportunities to interact scientifically, because other relevant professional meetings are focused on either a specific organism (e.g., the Drosophila meeting, the Zebrafish meeting) or a much broader field (e.g., the Society for Neuroscience, the Association for Research on Vision and Ophthalmology). The Visual System Development GRC has established a reputation as the leading conference in its field. The previous Visual System Development meetings have all been held in the United States, but the 2006 meeting will be at the GRC site in Italy. This venue provides an opportunity to increase the participation of European and Asian scientists, and this will broaden and enhance the diversity and quality of this conference. The current proposal requests funds to help defray the travel and conference fees for US scientists. In the selection of speakers and discussion leaders careful attention has been paid to gender and ethnic diversity and to the inclusion of scientists at various stages of their careers, all of whom have exciting new work to share with their colleagues.