Conference: 2022 Intrinsically Disordered Proteins GRS

The 2022 Gordon Research Seminar (GRS) on Intrinsically Disordered Proteins (IDPs) in Les Diablerets, Switzerland on June 25-26, 2022. This will be the fourth of a series of biannual conferences primarily attended by a diverse group of graduate students and postdocs. This seminar will bring together trainees from a wide range of disciplines to discuss current directions in the IDP field, as well as examine the interdisciplinary experimental and conceptual demands of contemporary IDP research.

The GRS provides an ideal setting to facilitate international and interdisciplinary collaboration. It will also provide key networking opportunities, as well as allowing a range of different perspectives to be discussed and compared - a key aspect for such a broad and diverse field.

The 2022 IDP GRS is focused on understanding how life harnesses disorder with the overarching theme of investigating emergent phenomena of intrinsically disordered proteins in living systems, and the ways that new insights in their biological functions have enabled their study and technological exploitation. The program will feature ten oral presentations accompanied by informal and formal discussions, as well as two poster sessions in which all participants are expected to participate.

The meeting will feature a small number of attendees (up to 60 participants). The presentations will be divided into four sessions. The first session (IDPs from theory to design) will focus on current theory and theory-driven advances in understanding IDPs, including experimental approaches whose hypotheses are motivated by computation or simulation driven insight.

The second session (IDPs and biological order across length scales) will focus on the emergent self-organizing properties of IDPs, including their ability to form materials such as non-membrane-bound biomolecular condensates. The third session (IDPs across the tree of life) will highlight the breadth of IDPs function from diverse clades, focusing on their evolution and variety of functional milieus.

The final session will consist of a career panel focusing on careers in academic science designed to help trainees become informed on scientific careers external to traditional academic positions.

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.