Conference: Multiscale Plant Vascular Biology, June 16-22, 2018, Mt. Snow, VT.

Gordon Research Conferences, East Greenwich RI

Investigators

Abstract

This award will support about 15 early-career scientists to participate in two linked conferences on the specific mechanisms used by plants for productivity, at scales from below the cell all the way up to the landscape. The conferences themselves focus on two factors that are tightly associated with plant growth and survival: water and photosynthate (sugars produced by plants during photosynthesis, that are used for building plants and that are the basis for all food consumed by all organisms on Earth). Most participants already work on the transport of one or both of these factors, but they usually only work at one or two of the following scales: gene transcription, cell physiology and development, wood or inner bark physiology or development, whole plant size and shape, or function of communities or entire landscapes. This conference provides an important venue to bring together researchers working on these different scales. The smaller conference is for early-career scientists, and the larger conference has special activities designed to help early-career scientists make meaningful relationships with more established scientists. The organizers expect that all scientists will benefit from these relationships, and so the conferences will not only move the fields of plant biology forward, but will enrich the worker-base to ensure continuing advancements in the field. This award will support the travel and registration costs of about 15 early-career scientists for two linked conferences, the five-day Gordon Research Conference (GRC), and the two-day Gordon Research Seminar (GRS) in the area of Multiscale Plant Vascular Biology (target sizes 200 scientists, and 50 early-career scientists, respectively). It is increasingly recognized that knowledge of water and photosynthate movement through systems gives much information about how that system functions, from the levels of subcellular parts up through landscapes. That same information may be used to understand how robust a system is to perturbation, and the basis for that robustness, which can be used in predictions and management for applications such as development of suitable plants for future conditions, understanding the links between plant physiology and climate-change-induced ecosystem shifts, and linking community transpiration to ground and atmospheric water stores. The GRC will focus on plasticity in these systems to help predict what is possible, and may show how the variability stabilizes or destabilizes systems at multiple scales. The GRS will provide a forum for early-career researchers in these fields to identify knowledge gaps in the role of vascular transport on climate change and that can be addressed through multidisciplinary collaborations. The conferences have three broader impacts. 1) Learning opportunity for a range of scientists, with an emphasis on early-career and participation of under-represented groups. The GRC will have four activities to encourage mixing and mentoring. The GRS has an agenda to facilitate peer interaction. The meetings are being advertised broadly through scientific societies and organizations that work to increase diversity in biological sciences. 2) Advancement of science, the elaboration of which may ultimately help ensure our continued existence on Earth given the importance of primary producers (plants) and the many risks to their health and productivity. 3) Development of community in a fragmented field. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.