The 2018 FASEB Summer Research Conference on Ubiquitin and Cellular Regulation will be held at Snowmass, Colorado, June 17 to 22, 2018. The FASEB-sponsored conference has been held biannually since 1989; this application seeks support for the 2018 conference. The conference will bring together approximately 150 investigators (junior and senior scientists, postdoctoral fellows, graduate students, and people from industry and government) for discussions of recent advances in the area of regulated proteolysis, with special emphasis on human diseases. Protein ubiquitination cuts across all fields of biology and the diversity of its impacts cannot be overstated. The selective degradation of proteins by the ubiquitin system is a mechanism for control of virtually all aspects of eukaryotic cell biology, including the cell cycle, transcription, metabolic pathways, development, and antigen processing. In addition, non-proteolytic functions of u b i q u i t i n a t i o n in protein trafficking and signaling are critical for processes that involve membrane receptors and signaling in the innate immune system, while others help to coordinate the DNA damage response. Dysfunction of the system is involved in many disease processes, particularly c a n c e r , neurologic and developmental diseases, and viral and microbial infectious diseases. In addition, ubiquitin- like proteins (also covered in this conference) are critical in infectious diseases, and it is now evident that microbes encode ubiquitin-like proteins, that bacteria and viruses produce enzymes to modulate and/or emulate cellular ubiquitination pathways in host cells, and that cells defend themselves against infectious agents with specific ubiquitin-like proteins. The topics of nine scientific sessions will be: (i) Mechanism of Ubiquitin Conjugation & Deconjugation; (ii) Ubiquitin Conjugation & Deconjugation structural biology; (iii) Proteasome and p97; (iv) UBL conjugation and deconjugation; (v) Protein quality control; (vi) Organelles and Trafficking; (vii) Ubiquitin Recognition and Signaling; (viii) Disease Pathology and Therapy; (ix) Stem Cells and Development. In addition, there will be four poster sessions. This conference will be a timely and important meeting in the area that is still rapidly growing. This conference is fairly unique in that it provides a format that brings together an extraordinary range of investigators whose collective approaches encompass cell biological, biochemical, molecular and genetic methods that address central issues in the regulation of cellular proliferation. The FASEB SRC format provides a unique environment that encourages informal and open discussions among the participants and this in turn fosters initiation of collaborative efforts and stimulates future research directions to broaden the understanding of the roles of ubiquitin, the proteasome, and ubiquitin-like proteins in health and disease.
The 2018 FASEB Summer Research Conference on Ubiquitin and Cellular Regulation will bring together a diverse group of investigators to exchange the latest unpublished results and discuss new ideas in the areas of protein ubiquitination, and modification by ubiquitin-like proteins and their effects on protein turnover and signaling. This will accelerate our understanding of cellular mechanisms at the basis of many human diseases, including cancer, neurologic and developmental diseases, and viral and microbial infectious diseases, as well as aging, ultimately leading to better treatments of these conditions.
