Funding is requested for the Cold Spring Harbor summer course on Arabidopsis Molecular Genetics. This course is a continuation of the course that has been funded by the National Science Foundation since its inception 18 years ago. The current emphasis on Arabidopsis as a model plant for the laboratory portion of the course reflects the current research interests of many US and international laboratories, allows students to take advantage of a wealth of genomic resources, and allows the course participants to focus on one system as they learn the more general biological or technical principals being taught. The course is designed to fulfill a growing need within the plant science community for training in this area. The intention is (1) to teach state of the art molecular techniques to scientists already involved in plant research so that they can apply these technologies to their own future research and (2) to teach scientists familiar with microbial, animal or plant systems about current research in plant biology using Arabidopsis as the model plant system. The course consists of a rigorous lecture series, a hands-on laboratory and informal discussions. Speakers will provide both an in-depth discussion of their work and an overview of their specialty. Many of these speakers will be experts in plant systems other than Arabidopsis thaliana; others will be non-plant scientists expert in disciplines that apply to all biological systems. The laboratory sessions provide an intensive training in modern techniques in plant biology and reinforce the lessons learned in lecture. The broader impact of the course is the training of plant researchers from throughout the world in the most recent information and techniques of the field. The students are chosen such that those who will likely disseminate information acquired in the course most broadly, i.e. professors and postdocs are favored. In typical years the students are an equal mix of male and female students, and efforts are made to achieve an ethnic diversity as well, with several students from last year coming from different countries. Many of the students of the course go on to lead their own laboratories and the course provides a foundation of knowledge for these new lab heads.
