Syvanen 9618669 The Fallen Leaf Lake Conference, initiated in 1985, is a bienneally held international meeting devoted to the molecular biology and genetics of microorganisms found in the environment. Past meetings have emphasized bacteria that grow on plants and in the soil. The 1996 conference will expand upon topics that have been previously covered to multidisciplinary area of horizontal gene transfer. The conference will therefore include and area of high priority in the assessment of risk in the release of genetically engineered microoganisms as well as explore a subject with profound theoretical implications. The Fallen Leaf Lake Conferences offer the special opportunity for participants to interact with experts in a variety of fields that touch upon horizontal gene transfer. Only the latest unpublished information is exchanged and ample opportunity is provided during the course of the conference for informal exchanges between participants. These conferences have an international complexion (for example, the typical conference has participants from Europe, Asis, Australia, South America, and the Middle East) and therefore the conference provides excellent opportunities for graduate students and postdoctoral to interact with internationally recognized experts. The conference will bring together a variety of people who have thought about horizontal gene transfer problems but from different perspectives. A multidisciplinary meeting will be needed to cover these different perspectives -- agricultural, medical and environmental microbiology, comparative systematics, virology, molecular evolution and even some paleontology. This will cover, for example, work in controlled field experiments that have measured movement of altered genes in genetically engineered organisms to native species, epidemiological surveys of during resistant genes in human pathogens and phylogenetic analyses of extant organisms that show the role of horizontal gene transfer in their history. In addition, a n umber of evolutionist will be invited to discuss evolutionary patterns and trends, with special emphasis on some problems in systematics and phylogenetics of plants.
