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28-31 May 2017  |  Portugal
About the event

Meet Our Speakers

David Keays

Dr. David Keays is a principal investigator of the Neuronal migration and magnetoreception lab at the Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP) in Vienna. Dr. Keays has received numerous awards including the Otto Loewi Prize in Neuroscience 2015, an ERC Starting Grant in 2013, the FWF START Prize in 2013 and an EMBO Young Investigator Award in 2013. Dr. David Keays research aims to understand two biological phenomena: 1) How do neurons migrate in the developing brain? and 2) How do animals detect magnetic fields? In tackling these two questions the lab adopts an interdisciplinary approach, employing a wide range of genetic, molecular, cellular, and behavioural tools.

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Many species on the planet, whether they are birds, fish or insects, rely on the Earth’s magnetic field to guide migration or assist navigation. This remarkable sense is known as magnetoreception. One idea that aims to explain how animals detect magnetic fields is known as the magnetite-based theory of magnetoreception. This theory holds that mechanosensitive ion channels coupled to an intracellular compass made of an iron oxide known as magnetite (Fe3O4) transduce local magnetic information into a neuronal impulse. We are using the rock pigeon Columbia livia as a model would like to understand where magnetosensory cells in avian species can be found. Recent electrophysiological studies have identified a population of neurons in the vestibular nuclei of pigeons that respond to magnetic vectors of a specific orientation and intensity (Wu and Dickman, 2012). These results strongly suggest that a population of unidentified magnetosensory cells lie in the inner ear of pigeons. We identified sensory hair cells that contain a single iron-rich organelle. This organelle is located directly beneath the stereocilia and is embedded in the actin-rich cuticular plate. We have shown that this structure is present in a wide range of avian species, but is not found in rodents, fish, or humans (Lauwers, Pichler et al., 2013). Our current work is focused on elucidating the function of this organelle, specifically whether it plays a direct or indirect role in magnetoreception.

Torres Vedras, Portugal

Venue
Speakers
ABOUT AMEEGUS

The 11th Annual Meeting of Gulbenkian Students (AmeeGuS) will take place from the 28th to the 31th of May 2017 in Portugal.

AMeeGuS was traditionally an internal meeting of the PhD students of the Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência (IGC) organized by second year PhD students which aimed to create an informal atmosphere where students developing their PhD work at the Institute could share and discuss their work with their peers.

This changed since the previous AMeeGuS, and for the second time we are going to have an international joint retreat with PhD students from FMI (Friedrich Miescher Institute, Basel).

 

 

Keep an eye on the website for more updates as AMeeGuS draws nearer! We expect it to be legendary and hope that you do too!

AMeeGuS Committee 2017.

Isabel Baurle

Dr. Isabel Baurle is the principal Investigator of the Plant Epigenetics and Stress Adaptation lab, at Universitat Potsdam, in Germany. In 2015, Dr. Isabel was awarded an EMBO Young Investigator grant for her work on the role of chromatin in environmental stress memory.
 

The main focus of her lab is the long-term adaptation of plants to abiotic stress and the role of epigenetics, chromatin regulation and transposons in this process.

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Abiotic stress is considered to be a major limitation to crop productivity, which can have impacts in the future, especially with the increase in human population.  When facing a recurring abiotic stress, plants can either respond to it or adapt. From these two outcomes, the second has received less attention, although now it is generally accepted that plants remember past exposure to abiotic stress and can even change their development or stress responses. However, the underlying molecular mechanism to this phenomenon is still poorly understood. Using Arabidopsis thaliana as a model plant and molecular and evolutionary approaches, Dr. Isabel’s lab aims to shed new light into how plants achieve a cellular memory and adapt to stressful conditions, possibly providing new approaches for crop improvement.

An EMBO Young Investigator travel grant will allow the AMeeGuS committee to have Dr. Isabel Baurle in the meeting this year.

James Rush

Dr. James Rush is a Senior Investigator in the Autoimmunity, Transplantation and Inflammation disease area at the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research in Basel. His lab focuses on the development of therapeutics targeting co-stimulation pathways dysregulated in autoimmunity. He is also responsible for research utilizing samples from individuals suffering select autoimmune diseases with the aim of identifying patient subpopulations that would potentially benefit from novel immunomodulatory drugs under development. Areas of focus include genomics, translational research and human immunology.
 

James joined the Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research Foundation in San Diego in May 2005 where his lab utilized high throughput genomics and small molecule screening technologies to identify novel regulators of innate immune receptor and B cell function. He then moved to NIBR in 2008 to lead a project team working on the development of a novel immunomodulatory drug for transplantation and lupus. His lab continues to engage in exploratory research, with a focus on deriving and utilizing pathway gene signatures to better understand the molecular regulation of immunopathology in complex autoimmune diseases.
 

James received his B.App.Sci (Hons) from the University of Western Sydney in 1994 and Ph.D. from Sydney University in 2000. He completed a HHMI postdoctoral fellowship at Yale University in the laboratories of David Schatz and Charlie Janeway. 

Xavier Belles

Dr. Xavier Belles is the principal investigator of the Evolution of insect Metamorphosis lab, at Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas from the Universitat Pompeu Fabra, in Barcelona. Besides running his own lab, Dr. Belles is also the former Director of the Evolutionary Biology Institute (IBE) at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
 

He is an expert in entomology and insect physiology. The main focus of his lab is the endocrine regulation of insect metamorphosis from both developmental and evolutionary perspectives. Insect metamorphosis is a subject that is mainly studied using holometabolous organisms (that undergo complete metarmorphosis, with the larval and adult stages separated by an intermediate pupal stage). Dr. Xavier Belles makes the difference by focusing his research on the cockroach Blatella germanica, which is a species that undergoes a gradual metamorphosis and is therefore, closer to the ancestral state. By studying B. germanica, Dr. Belles aims at understanding which are the mechanisms regulating metamorphosis in this species and comparing these to the ones operating in insects with a complete transformation. 

Registration

We can't wait to see you there!

Registration is open until April-21st!

Don't forget to submit your abstracts by then!

Next to your name, don't forget to indicate if you are arranging your own transportation or going by bus.

Registration

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