INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON PLASMID BIOLOGY 1998
PROGRAM
Saturday October 10

15:00 Registration
19:00 Dinner

Sunday October 11

Transfer and Establishment
07:00 Breakfast
08:30 Opening
08:45 Keynote Address: Laura Frost (Edmonton).
The Role of the F Pilus in Bacterial Conjugation: Evidence for "Triggering" DNA transfer.

Oral Presentations
Chairperson: Christopher M. Thomas (Birmingham)

09:45 Gregor Högenauer (Graz)
Protein TraM, a crucial component of the conjugation machinery of  plasmid R1.

10:15 Vilma Stanisich (Bundoora)
Two classes of fertility inhibition genes that affect the conjugal functions of IncP plasmids.

10:45 Coffee Break
11:15 Fernando de la Cruz (Santander)
Architecture of plasmid R388 conjugative relaxosome

11:45 Elisabeth Grohmann (Berlin)
MobM,the relaxase involved in conjugative mobilization of the streptococcal plasmid pMV158.

12:30 Lunch

Oral Presentations
Chairperson: S. Austin (Frederick)

14:30 Stephen Farrand (Urbana)
Regulation of Ti plasmid conjugation by extrinsic and intrinsic signaling
systems. Sensing the right place and the right time.

15:00 Clarence I. Kado (Davis)
Mechanism of Agrobacterium -mediated horizontal transmission.

15:30 Coffee Break

16:00 Don B. Clewell (Ann Arbor)
Regulation of pAD1 Sex Pheromone Response in Enterococcus faecalis.

16:30 Keynote Address: Günther Muth (Tübingen)
Conjugative gene transfer in mycel-forming streptomycetes: organization of
Streptomyces rolling-circle-type plasmids

18:30 Dinner
20:00 Poster Session I (Transfer and Establishment)

Monday October 12

Replication I

07:00 Breakfast

08:30 Keynote Address: Donald R. Helinski (San Diego)
Initiating and Regulating the Replication of Broad and Narrow Host Range
Plasmids Containing Iterons at their Origin.

Oral Presentations

Chairperson: Gregor Högenauer (Graz)

09:30 Dhruba Chattoraj (Bethesda)
Origin as a Negative Regulator of P1 Plasmid Replication.

10:00 Marcin Filutowicz (Madison)
Positive and negative controls of replication: Copy up substitutions enhance activator function of p35.0 and decrease inhibitor function of p30.5

10:30 Coffee Break

11:00 Miguel Angel Cevallos (Cuernavaca)
The RepABC plasmid family: a structural analysis.

11:30 Deepak Bastia (Duke)
Mechanism of termination of DNA replication in bacterial and plasmid chromosomes.

12:30 Lunch

Oral Presentations

Chairperson: Laura Frost (Edmonton)

14:30 Laurent Jannière (Jouy en Josas)
Initiation of pAMb1 replication: mechanism and effect on rolling-circle
replication in cis.

15:00 Cristopher D. Thomas (Leeds)
Replication of staphylococcal plasmid pC221: Molecular mechanism of
initiator protein activity.

15:30 Coffee Break

16:00 William Firshein (Middletown)
The initiator proteins encoded by plasmid RK2 (TrfA) have domains that interact with the membrane of E. coli and are essential for viability.

16:30 Carton W. Chen (Taipei)
The linear plasmid SLP2 of Streptomyces lividans: structure and relationship to the linear chromosome

18:30 Dinner

20:00 Poster Session II (Replication / Evolution)

Tuesday October 13

Partitioning and Stability

07:00 Breakfast

08:30 Keynote Address: Kenn Gerdes (Odense)
Plasmid Maintenance Systems: Partitioning and Proteic Plasmid
Stabilization Systems.

Oral Presentations

Chairperson: Martine Couturier (Brussels)

09:30 James Sawitzke (Frederick)
E. coli Chromosome Segregation: Insights from Studies on MukB, SeqA and the P1 Plasmid Par Proteins.

10:00 Andrew Wright (Tufts)
Segregation of plasmids F and P1 visualized using green fluorescent protein.

10:30 Coffee Break

11:00 David K. Summers (Cambridge)
Multicopy Plasmid Stability in E. coli.

11:30 Eva Björkman (Uppsala)
A Plasmid R1 Dimer: Copy Number, Stability of Maintenance, and Effect on Cell Division.

12:30 Lunch

Oral Presentations

Chairperson: Manuel Espinosa (Madrid)

14:30 David H. Figurski (New York)
Genetic and functional analysis of the kilE locus of IncPa plasmid RK2
required for stable maintenance in Pseudomonas aeruginosa.

15:00 Keith E. Weaver (Vermillion)
The pAD1 par locus: a Gram-positive post-segregational killing mechanism
regulated by an antisense RNA.

15:30 Coffee Break

16:00 Piotr Ceglowski (Warsaw)
Characterization of the region involved in a better-than-random segregation of streptococcal plasmid pSM19035.

16:30 Nadja B. Shoemaker (Urbana)
Integrated Transmissible Bacteroides Elements

17:00 Sierd Bron (Haaren)
Gene Function Analysis of Bacillus Plasmids

18:30 Dinner

20:00 Poster Session III (Partitioning and Stability / Implications- Applications.

Wednesday October 14

Evolution

07:00 Breakfast

08:30 Keynote Address: Cristopher M. Thomas (Birmingham)
Evolution of IncP-1 and IncP-9 plasmids: vehicles for promiscuous gene spread in Gram-negative bacteria.

Oral Presentations

Chairperson: Ichizo Kobayashi (Tokyo)

09:30 Xavier Perret (Geneve)
The symbiotic plasmid ofRhizobium sp. NGR234: structure, evolution and
transcription.

10:00 Rafael Palacios (Cuernavaca)
Gene amplification in Rhizobium .

10:30 Coffee Break

11:00 Stephen Farrand (Urbana)
Common replicons linked to conjugal transfer systems in the plasmids of Agrobacterium and Rhizobium. Implications to evolution of plasmid types as well as genus designation.

11:30 A. Mark Osborn (Braunschweig)
Phylogenetic analysis of plasmid replicons: implications for plasmid evolution and classification.

12:30 Lunch

Oral Presentations

Chairperson: Ichizo Kobayashi (Tokyo)

14:00 V. N. Rybchin (St. Petersburg)
Characterization of the linear plasmid prophage N15 with covalently closed
ends.

14:30 Patricia A. Sobecky (Atlanta)
Unexpected Diversity in the Ocean: Plasmids Isolated from Marine Bacteria Contain Replication and Incompatibility Regions Unrelated to Those of Known Plasmid Groups.

15:00 Keynote Address: Ronald A. Skurray (Sidney)
Structure and Evolution of Conjugative and Non-Conjugative Multiresistance Plasmids in Staphylococci.

17:45 Dinner

19:00 EXCURSION TO UXMAL

Thursday October 15

Replication II

07:00 Breakfast

08:30 Keynote Address: Saleem Khan (Pittsburgh)
Initiation and termination of rolling-circle plasmid replication.

Oral Presentations

Chairperson: Kurt Nordström (Uppsala)

09:30 Manuel Espinosa (Madrid)
Biochemical and biophysical features of the CopG regulatory protein encoded by plasmid pMV158. Crystal structure of the CopG-DNA target.

10:00 E. Gerhart H. Wagner (Uppsala)
Antisense RNA control in plasmid R1: new insights into the binding pathway of CopA and CopT

10:30 Coffee Break

11:00 Sabine Brantl (Jena)
Biochemical characterization of the pIP501 encoded transcriptional repressor CopR.

11:30 Stéphanie Marsin (Orsay)
A rolling circle replication initiator protein with a nucleotidyl-transferase activity encoded by the plasmid pGT5 from the hyperthermophilic archaeon Pyrococcus abyssi.

12:30 Lunch

Implications-Applications

Oral Presentations

Chairperson: Douglas Rawlings (Stellenbosch)

14:30 Simon Silver (Chicago)
Bacterial plasmid resistance to toxic heavy metals: new silver resistance and new spins on older metals.

15:00 Kornelia Smalla (Braunschweig)
New approaches to study prevalence and diversity of plasmids in bacteria of
different environments.

15:30 Coffee Break

16:00 Paul Baumann (Davis)
Plasmid-dependent Adaptation of Buchnera to an Endosymbiotic Association with Aphids.

16:30 Christoph C. Tebbe (Braunschweig)
Intergeneric transfer of marker gene-tagged plasmids in the gut of the soil microarthropod, Folsomia candida (Collembola).

17:00 Keynote Address: Søren Molin (Lyngby)
Plasmid transfer in microbial surface communities: The need for in situ investigations of microbial activity.

20:00 Farewell Banquet

Friday October 16

Breakfast, Departure
 
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