The 15th Gordon Research Conference on Atherosclerosis will be held at the Kimball Union Academy in Meriden, NH on June 24-29, 2001. This international conference, which has been held every two years since 1971, will provide an overview of the most important recent developments in the pathobiology of atherosclerosis. The meeting will discuss the various stages in lesion development, proceeding from different risk factors, to lesion initiation, foam cell formation and regression, the inflammatory response of the vessel wall, complexity of lesions, rupture and thrombosis, genetics, intervention and diagnosis. The combined interaction of various risk factors in mechanisms of atherogenesis, particularly hyperlipidemia, hypertension and diabetes, will be discussed. Throughout special emphasis will be placed on cutting edge technologies and resources that are relevant to the biology of atherosclerosis. Accordingly, there will be discussion of functional genomics, expression arrays, proteomics, sequence database utilization and new approaches in human and mouse genetics. Nine sessions are planned and will cover the following topics: 1. Etiology of Atherosclerosis: Lipoproteins and other Risk Factors (hypertension, diabetes, homocystinemia); 2. Lesion Initiation; 3. Inflammation; 4. Foam Cell Formation and Regression; 5. Complexity of Lesions; 6. Plaque Rupture and Thrombosis; 7. Genomic Approaches; 8. Intervention and Diagnosis; 9. The Genome Project and Vascular Disease. The conference will be a major vehicle for the integration of new knowledge in the field of atherosclerosis research. In order to stimulate an interdisciplinary dialogue, speakers will be invited who represent distinct but overlapping areas of research such as hypertension, genomics, lipoproteins and vascular biology. The conference will encourage the participation of women and minorities. Some of the invited speakers represent young scientists at the beginning of their independent careers. Participation of young scientists will also be encouraged through poster sessions. The conference is planned in such a way that by the end of the conference, the participants will have derived an overall understanding of the biogenesis of atherosclerosis, and will have a clear picture of the latest most exciting developments in the field.
