This July 15-16, the Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source is hosting a series of talks and fun informal discussions on the future directions of extreme biology research with special emphasis on structural and biophysical methods.
Join the meeting
These four short sessions over two days are intended to cover broad areas and should be accessible to persons outside the field. Though topics are suggested, nothing is written in stone and nothing is off the table.
Each day will feature an IDEA SLAM! Give us your 3-min “elevator pitch” and tell us about your research: what is hot in your field? What is your dream experiment (X-ray or otherwise)? These strictly timed sessions are very popular among both students and PI’s. Register at the link provided!
Talks and discussion will roughly cover the topics below, but don’t be shy in the discussion! Feel free to bring up topics we have overlooked. All sessions are virtual, via Zoom.
Extreme Experiments (July 15 - morning) - Session Chair: R. Gillilan
High speed pressure/temperature jump and time-resolved experiments. Structural biology under extreme conditions. Anaerobic conditions, noxious gasses and nasty compounds. Extreme magnetic fields?
Extreme Biophysics (July 15 - afternoon) - Session Chair: G. Makhatadze
Pressure perturbation, protein folding, lipid phases and phase diagrams, liquid-liquid phase separation (LLPS), intrinsically disordered proteins (IDP’s), structural biology under extreme conditions.
Extreme Life (July 16 - morning)- Session Chair: B. Barstow
Extremophiles and adaptation, weird metabolisms and pathways, membraneless organelles (MLO’s), geomicrobiology, industrial applications.
Extreme Phylogenetics (July 16 - afternoon)- Session Chair: A. Burnim
Ancestral sequence reconstruction, evolutionary biophysics and structure, exobiology and environment of ancient earth.
Download the workshop flyer here!
AGENDA
All times: (EDT): New York (UTC/GMT -4 hours)
Thursday, July 15th
|
Extreme Experiments
|
Title |
|---|---|---|
|
10:00 am |
Welcome |
Welcome! |
|
10:10 am |
Kevin Gardner (CUNY) |
High pressure NMR: Probe of protein conformation and dynamics |
|
10:35 am |
Julian Roche (Iowa State) |
Protein allosteric couplings under pressure: an extra layer of complexity? |
|
11:00 am |
Michael Thompson (UC Merced) |
Turning up the Heat on Dynamic Proteins with Temperature-Jump Crystallography and SAXS/WAXS |
|
11:25 am |
Tzanko Doukov (SSRL) |
Physiological crystallography |
|
11:50 am |
Open Discussion |
|
|
12:30 |
Lunch break |
|
Thursday, July 15th
|
Extreme Biophysics
|
Title |
|---|---|---|
|
1:00 pm |
Amir Haji-Akbari (Yale) |
Role of thermodynamically-driven phase separations in biological self-assembly |
|
1:25 pm |
Erik Martin (St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital) |
Conformations, dynamics, and phase separation of disordered proteins. |
|
1:50 pm |
Martin Greubele (UIUC) |
Fast pressure jumps and protein phase diagrams |
|
2:15 pm |
George Makhatadze (RPI) |
How pressure unfolds proteins: experiments and computational modeling |
|
2:40 pm |
Open Discussion / Idea slam |
*Presentations listed below agenda |
Friday, July 16th
|
Extreme Life
|
Title |
|---|---|---|
|
9:00 am |
Welcome/Introduction |
Welcome/Introduction |
|
9:10 am |
Idea Slam |
*Presentations listed below agenda |
|
9:40 am |
Mackenzie Gerringer (SUNY Geneseo) |
Pressure adaptation in the deep oceans: insights from the enzymes of hadal fishes |
|
10:05 am |
Medin/Marecos (Barstow grp) |
Using Shewanella oneidensis to biosorb Rare Earth Elements / Bioleaching of Rare Earth Elements by Gluconobacter oxydan |
|
10:30 am |
Itay Budin (UCSD) |
Interrogating the biophysical tradeoffs in cell membrane adaptation through lipid engineering |
|
10:55 am |
Eric Boyd (U. Montana) |
Reductive dissolution of FeS2: probing primitive pathways of iron sulfur cluster biosynthesis in methanogens |
|
11:20 am |
Jacob Winnikoff (MBARI) |
Grease Under Pressure: Membrane Adaptation in Deep-Sea Ctenophores |
|
11:45 am |
Discussion |
|
|
12:30 |
Lunch break |
|
Friday, July 16th
|
Extreme Phylogenetics
|
Title |
|---|---|---|
|
1:00 pm |
Birte Hocker (U. Bayreuth) |
Evolution and design of protein folds |
|
1:25 pm |
Betül Kaçar (U. Arizona) |
Exploring life’s origin and early evolution by utilizing experimentally resurrected ancestral enzymes |
|
1:50 pm |
Douglas Theobald (Brandeis) |
Are ancestral protein resurrections too thermostable? |
|
2:15 pm |
open discussion |
|
*IDEA SLAMMERS:
Thursday:
Alaji Bah - TBD
Jordan Berger - High Pressure Applications with Protein Stability
Mayank Boob - How does sequence stabilize protein in extreme pressure?
Alfredo Caro - Pressure and protein dynamics
Siddhant Sharma - Prebiotic Chemistry
Matt McLeod - High Temperature Measurements of Proteins
Alexandra Zidovska - The Genome Under Extreme Conditions
Dmitri Davydov - Conformational ambiguity in piezophilic enzymes at ambient pressure: How may it help to understand enzymatic mechanisms?
Friday:
Ilankuzhali Elavarasan - Extremophilic Fungi for bioremediation of Martian regolith
Jovel Varghe Jose - Radioprotectants as a countermeasures for space radiation
Arunava Poddar - Extremophiles for biomining in extraterrestrial environments.
Navaneel Sarangi - Radioprotection in Human Cells using Tardigrade Proteins
Kashish Gupta - Life Detection Technology
Life is now known to exist in some of the most extreme and hostile environments imaginable: corrosive pools, rock pores in the desert, coal beds kilometers under the sea floor, deep ocean hydrothermal vents spewing superheated water, and even permafrost at -17C. These organisms are not mere curiosities: they are major players in the Earth’s environmental processes and they have implications for understanding the origin of life and the possibility of life on other worlds. The remarkable and even weird chemistry and physiological adaptation strategies of such organisms promises to be a rich source of discovery and valuable tools in the decades ahead.
What are the coming challenges in this field? What structural, biophysical and data interpretation methods will researchers need? This series of short overview talks followed by informal discussion will focus on identifying emerging trends in all areas of extreme biology research. Discussion of X-ray techniques is welcome, but we hope to encourage “thinking outside the box” with broad, highly speculative, interdisciplinary discussion looking far into the future. Discussion should not be limited to what is currently possible! This workshop will *not* be recorded.