David W Smith Workshop on Malformations/Morphogenesis

描述（由申请人提供）：大卫W。史密斯畸形和形态发生年度研讨会已举办24年，汇集了畸形学家、胚胎学家、解剖学家、遗传学家以及其他致力于更好地了解人类畸形如何发生以及形态发生潜在机制的人士。该研讨会每年举行一次，是为了庆祝大卫W。史密斯是人类临床畸形学之父，他首先发起了这些会议。会议通常在夏季的学术校园举行约五天，并有120-140人参加，他们是在提交摘要后选出的，并由科学计划委员会审查。研讨会旨在进行互动交流，因此仅限于当年的演讲者。大约每五年举行一次国际会议，但大多数会议在美国或加拿大举行。每年由组织者选择三到五个中心主题;主题的选择考虑到主题最后一次成为焦点的时间，基于新科学发展的及时性和新领域。作为一个例子，今年将集中在大脑发育，颅面发育，泌尿生殖系统的发展，和后生，额外的会议致力于畸形和形态发生的更一般的问题，并根据当年提交的摘要。会议包括一个研讨会的形式，其中假设驱动的结果的简短介绍，然后由一个激烈的讨论期。这些会议有着广泛和令人振奋的讨论的悠久历史，并为发展和招募研究员和初级教师进入畸形和形态发生领域提供了特别重要的重点。这项建议是要求以研究员、初级教员和选定的一些全体发言人的旅费津贴的形式为这些会议提供持续的支助。这些会议有一个基于参与者的奉献精神的持续成功的历史，本提案的目标是提供额外的稳定性，特别强调这一研究调查界的新成员的参与。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The David W. Smith Annual Workshops on Malformations and Morphogenesis have been held for 24 years and bring together a mix of dysmorphologists, embryologists, anatomists, geneticists, and others who work on developing a better understanding of how human malformations occur and there underlying mechanisms of morphogenesis. The workshops are held annually and were initiated in celebration of the career of David W. Smith who was the father of human clinical dysmorphology and first initiated these meetings. Meetings are held over approximately five days typically on an academic campus in the summer and have an attendance of 120-140 individuals who are selected following submissions of abstracts and reviewed by the scientific program committee. The workshop is intended to be an interactive exchange and thus is limited only to those presenting that year. Approximately every five years the meetings have been held internationally but most meetings are in the United States or Canada. Each year three to five central topics are selected by the organizers; the selection of topics takes into account when the topic had last been a focus, timeliness based on new scientific developments, and new fields. As an example, this year will focus on brain development, craniofacial development, urogenital development, and epigenesis, additional sessions are devoted to more general issues of malformation and morphogenesis and based on the abstracts submitted that year. The meetings consist of a workshop format in which short presentations of hypothesis driven findings are then followed by an intense discussion period. The meetings have a long history of wide-ranging and stimulating discussion and have provided an especially important focus for the development and recruitment of fellows and junior faculty into the field of malformation and morphogenesis. This proposal is a request to provide continuing support for these meetings in the form of travel stipends for fellows, junior faculty, and a select number of plenary speakers. These meetings have had a history of continued success based on the dedication of the participants and the goal of this proposal is to provide additional stability with a particular emphasis on the involvement of new members of this research investigative community.