CONFERENCE: 57th Annual Maize Genetics Conference to be held March 12-15, 2015, at the Pheasant Run Resort in St. Charles, Illinois

University Of Florida, Gainesville FL

Investigators

Abstract

The 57th Maize Genetics Conference (MGC) will be held at the Pheasant Run Resort, St. Charles, IL on March 12-15, 2015. This conference is not only an exciting scientific meeting but provides outstanding opportunities for graduate students and postdoctoral scientists to interact with outstanding scientists within and outside the maize community. The meeting actively emphasizes and supports the training of students and postdocs in developing their communication and interpersonal skills. The conference is unique in that it attempts to support the hotel and meal costs of all student attendees. Detailed efforts are planned to broaden the participation of women and members of groups under-represented in the sciences. The funding provided by NSF will broaden participation and help defray the costs of participation of students from the U.S. scientific community. The Maize Genetics Conference assembles scientists from industry and academia to discuss the latest research developments on many areas encompassing maize genetics. The 2015 conference will feature four plenary speakers: Drs. Xuemei Chen (University of California-Riverside), Dirk Inze (Ghent University, Belgium), Shawn Kaeppler (University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Paula McSteen (University of Missouri). The core program will include approximately 35 18-minute talks by speakers selected from submitted abstracts, and two poster sessions. In addition, there will be a plenary session to award the 2nd Barbara McClintock Prize for Plant Genetics and Genome Studies to recognize one of the most outstanding plant geneticists of the present era. In response to rapid developments in targeted endonuclease technologies, there will also be a special session on genome editing in maize using CRISPR/Cas-9 technologies.