2011 Cold Spring Harbor Conference on Computational Cell Biology

Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Cold Spg Hbr NY

Investigators

Abstract

In the last several decades a great deal of effort has gone into identifying the proteins and genes that respond to specific inputs and assembling them into consensus signal transduction pathways. These pathways, which control all aspects of cell physiology, have turned out to be very complex, with many interactions and feedbacks between different parts of the network. How can we move beyond identifying new network components and interactions and develop a detailed, quantitative understanding of their behavior? How can we translate the static biochemical description of molecular regulatory networks into a dynamic, functional one? Questions like these gave birth to the interdisciplinary field of computational cell biology, which applies the mathematics of dynamical systems with computer simulations to develop new insights and understanding of fundamental biological processes. This discipline is focused on combining quantitative experimental data with mathematical models and simulation of the molecular machinery (genes-proteinsmetabolites) that underlie the physiological behavior of living cells. The proposed conference on Computational Cell Biology is intended to bring together a diverse group of scientists, studying various molecular, structural, and functional aspects of cellular processes, using computational approaches. This meeting is intended to provide a forum for the exchange of ideas, information, and approaches, and to discuss the latest research findings and technical advances towards understanding cells at a quantitative and theoretical level. The size and location of this meeting facilitates interactions between experimentalists and theoreticians, which are vital for an interdisciplinary field such as computational cell biology. Researchers will join together to discuss the latest breakthroughs obtained using novel experimental and theoretical approaches in diverse model systems. The broader impacts of the proposed activity are manifold. First, they include the scientific implications for other fields beyond computational cell biology, as discoveries in this field will continue to foster a rapid pace of fundamental discoveries and insights that impact efforts to model the dynamical behavior of living systems. Second, they also include elements of education, training, resource sharing, and opportunities for interaction and collaboration. In particular, the meeting will provide: (i) training opportunities for junior scientists that will promote the development of presentation skills as well as overall scientific quality and analytical rigor; (ii) an intimate setting that will foster meaningful scientific interactions among scientists at all career levels; (iii) the dissemination of knowledge among multiple strata of research and educational institutions; (iv) sharing of resources, both material and informational; and (v) opportunities for the initiation of collaborations, which can benefit scientists from smaller labs and/or from primarily undergraduate (teaching) institutions who may have fewer resources and more limited access to cutting-edge technologies than do scientists from major research institutions.