Microbe-host Interaction: Pathogenesis

In recent decades infectious diseases have become a vital, resurgent field of research. The relationship between hosts and pathogens are dynamic, and are crucial for understanding and checking infections. In this session we aim to highlight the various issues falling under the broad umbrella of “infection”, from both the host’s and the pathogen’s point of view. This session welcomes researchers in the field of human, animal or plant diseases, microbiology or immunology to share their work.

Keywords: Bacterial and Fungal Pathogens, Viruses, Host Defense, Virulence Genetics, Immune Evasion

Microbe-host Interaction: Symbiosis

Partnership and communication can be an essential part of life in microbial associations. This session will hone in on the exiting field of mutualistic symbiosis between a wide range of organisms including plants, bacteria, fungi, algae and insects. Researchers working on symbiotic processes are encouraged to join this session and dive into this exciting topic.

Keywords: Plant Microbiology, Normal Flora, Mycrorrhizal Associations, Bacterial Symbiosis

Microbes in the environment

Microorganisms are ubiquitous and a critical ecological component of the Earth system and interact with the biosphere through complex feedback systems, from adapting to environmental changes to regulating global biogeochemical cycles. This session will focus on the dynamic interactions that exist between microbes and their environment. We welcome research findings from the field of environmental microbiology, whether laboratory experiments, field measurements or applications.

Keywords: Aquatic Microbiology, Marine Science, Terrestrial Microbiology, Geomicrobiology

Molecular communication

Communication is thought to be an exchange of information between interacting partners, but it is not trivial to separate out simple interactions from highly developed forms of communication, or to define communication on the molecular level. This session will give an opportunity for young scientists to forward their ideas of talking microbes or even molecules. Due to the molecular aspect the content would evolve around molecular biology, genetics, microbiology, cell biology and anything you can think of which was not covered by any other sessions. We hope to hear interesting talks about the molecular aspects of communication in a wide range of topics!

Keywords: Molecules, Genetics, Microbial Communication, Mixed topics

Microbes in models and methods

With the overwhelmingly large amount of available data generated by experiments, questions regarding objective interpretation naturally arise. Therefore it is necessary to have software tools that model systems by transformation, utilization or recreation of those datasets in order to gain deeper and better insights in biological processes. The fruitful interplay of theoreticians and experimenters leads to the promising field of Systems Biology, a major focus of this session. Contributions from the fields of physics, chemistry biology will also be discussed as we link different scientific areas and to improve our understanding of complex, interdisciplinary processes in biological systems.

Keywords: Systems Biology, Simulation, Theory and Modeling, Method Application, Technique Development