The proposed meeting, """"""""Glia in Health &Disease"""""""", will be held at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on July 22 - 26th, 2010 and subsequently in 2012 and 2014. It is becoming increasingly clear that glial cells are critical participants in every major aspect of brain development, function, and disease. Far more active than once thought, glia play key roles in the development and function of axons and synapses, nervous system plasticity, and blood flow. Glia secrete many substances whose roles are not yet understood, and they are central players in CNS injury and disease. The goal of this conference is to provide an active forum for exchange of results in the rapidly advancing fields of glial biology and neuron-glia interactions. It will span a broad range of areas of investigation including genetics, molecular biology, biochemistry, physiology, and high resolution imaging. Studies from both invertebrate and vertebrate model systems will be presented. The meeting plans to 1) assemble an international meeting of scientists interested in various aspects of glial biology and neuron-glia interactions in health and disease;2) discuss new and exciting developments in the field by selecting talks from openly submitted abstracts on the basis of scientific merit;3) provide an opportunity to junior as well as senior participants to present their data;and 4) promote collaborative interactions that extend beyond the meeting.
Mammalian brains are made up of several kinds of cell. Much emphasis in modern neuroscience has been placed on the function of neurons that provide the """"""""wiring"""""""" in the brain, but glial cells, almost equal in abundance to neurons, are increasingly understood to do more than play a supporting role. In the last ten years, it has become apparent that glial cells are critical participants in every major aspect of brain development, function, and disease. Evidence is also growing that glia play an important role in modulating blood flow in the brain, acting to direct oxygenated blood to more active regions. Finally, many lines of research are converging to elucidate how glia modulate neurotransmission, and thus how they may provide an additional layer of regulation and control to information processing in the brain. This biennial international conference (2010, 2012 and 2014) will provide a forum for these scientists to share their latest discoveries and will bring together the leading experts in the field.
