The 15th Computational Chemistry Gordon Research Conference (CC-GRC) will be convened at Mount Snow, Vermont during July 2014. The conference has been held in the summer of every even-numbered year beginning in 1986. Traditionally, the meeting covers a wide range of topics drawn from the interdisciplinary field of computational chemistry and molecular modeling. There is always a strong emphasis on development of new techniques across quantum chemistry, force fields and information/database-derived empirical potentials. Individual sessions on recently emerging application areas are also presented at each conference. One longstanding focus is the use of computer methodology the context of biochemical, biophysical and biomedical applications, such as refinement of biomolecular structure, protein folding, enzyme reaction mechanisms, biochemistry of ions, and nucleic acid interactions, to name just a few areas. The technical and development focus of the CC-GRC is complimentary to the Computer-Aided Drug Design GRC, a sister conference held in odd-numbered years. In addition to a balance of researchers from academic labs, foundations, and government and industrial labs, the conference has attracted a large number of postdoctoral and graduate student participants in recent years. In addition to a core group of repeat academic and industrial attendees, approximately half of the roughly 150 attendees are at their first Gordon Conference. For the first time in 2014, the CC-GRC will be preceded by a two-day Gordon Research Seminar in Computational Chemistry (CC-GRS), targeting younger scientists and including poster sessions, student research talks, networking opportunities, and mentoring from a select handful of senior researchers. CC-GRS attendees will stay for the main GRC during the immediately following week. The funds requested under this proposal will be used to offset travel and meeting registration expenses for scientists from smaller labs that may not have funds themselves, as well as student and postdocs attending the GRS and the main GRC.
The Computational Chemistry Gordon Research Conference provides a forum for discussion of molecular modeling and other computational techniques. This interdisciplinary field encompasses methodology widely used across much of contemporary biomedical research, with particular application to biomolecular structure, drug design, and macromolecular interactions. The associated Gordon Research Seminar, held for the first time in 2014, will allow younger scientists in this field to present their work, network outside their particular research area, and gain information about possible career paths in computational chemistry.
