International q-bio Conference on Cellular Information Processing

The International q-bio Conference on Cellular Information Processing is a leading systems biology conference intended to advance predictive modeling of cellular regulation. The emphasis is on modeling and quantitative experimentation for understanding and predicting the behaviors of particular regulatory systems, phenomena that manifest themselves in many biological systems, and/or general principles of cellular information processing.

The q-bio Conference logo: St. John's College clock tower

The conference has been variously called by its participants "a watershed moment in modern biology" (John Doyle, Caltech),^[1] "the conference with the most energy in years" (A. Dale Kaiser, Stanford University),^[1] "an intellectual home" (Ido Golding, UIUC),^[2] and "the best systems biology conference" (exit interviews of participants).^[3]

The q-bio conference is organized by the Center for Nonlinear Studies at the Los Alamos National Laboratory and is further supported by NIGMS, the Center for Spatiotemporal Modeling of Cell Signaling Networks at the University of New Mexico Cancer Center, and other sponsors. It is held annually during the second week of August in Santa Fe, New Mexico, on the campus of St. John's College. The first conference was held in 2007. The conference is preceded by the The q-bio Summer School, a two-and-a-half-week-long school in Los Alamos, NM, which introduces graduate students and postdocs to modeling of complex biological systems.

The conference has featured about 30 invited talks, 10-20 contributed talks, and over 100 poster presentations. About 200 participants attend, and they are housed typically in St. John's student housing, creating an informal atmosphere encouraging spontaneous scientific discussions. Conference proceedings are published by IET Systems Biology.^[4]

The q-bio 2007 Poster Session

The conference has featured some of the best-recognized scientists working in the q-bio field, including over a dozen members of the United States National Academies.

Upcoming conference

• q-bio 2011, August 10-14, 2010.

Previous conferences

• q-bio 2010, August 11–14, 2010.
• q-bio 2009, August 5–9, 2009, featuring, among others:
  • Bruce Alberts (opening speaker)
  • Carlos Bustamante
  • Rita Colwell
  • Nina Fedoroff
  • Michael Levine (closing speaker)
  • Douglas Lauffenburger
  • Vamsi Mootha
  • Anthony Pawson
  • Linda Petzold
  • Alice Ting
• q-bio 2008, August 6–9, 2008, featuring, among others:
  • Adam Arkin (closing speaker)
  • Robert Austin
  • Howard Berg (opening speaker)
  • Sergey M. Bezrukov
  • Arthur Lander
  • Thomas Pollard
  • Lucy Shapiro
  • Eduardo Sontag
  • Peter Wolynes
• q-bio 2007, August 8–11, 2007

External links

• The International q-bio Conference
• The q-bio Summer School
• Center for Nonlinear Studies at LANL
• The q-bio Public Lecture Series in Santa Fe, NM
• The q-bio Seminar Series at LANL

References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 J Edwards, J Faeder, W Hlavacek, Y Jiang, I Nemenman, and M Wall. Molecular Systems Biology 3:148, 2007.
2. ↑ I. Golding. q-bio Conference Lecture, Aug 2008.
3. ↑ Participants exit interviews, 2007-2008. Available from CNLS/LANL.
4. ↑ I. Nemenman, W.S. Hlavacek, J.S. Edwards, J.R. Faeder, Y. Jiang, and M.E. Wall. Editorial: Selected papers from the First q-bio Conference on Cellular Information Processing. IET Syst. Biol. 2, 203 (2008).