The Molecular Membrane Biology Gordon Conference covers advances in organelle biology and membrane traffic. This field is entering a particularly exciting phase as the basic principles of membrane traffic and organization have emerged to an extent where they can start to be applied to understanding the roles of organelles in important processes such as development, autophagy, familial diseases and the invasion of cells by pathogens. It is also becoming possible to link organelles into a larger picture of cellular organization via their associations with the cytoskeleton and with lipid traffic. This progress is being helped by new methodology including high throughput screening, super resolution microscopy and advanced biophysical methods. These developments will be covered by the invited speakers (listed below), along with the latest progress on the fundamental mechanisms of membrane biogenesis and organelle function.

All applicants, and especially those from under-represented demographics (i.e. women, minorities, junior investigators) are strongly encouraged to submit a brief abstract describing their work, and to indicate whether they would like their abstract to be considered for one of the eighteen short talks which are divided between all sessions.

We intend to select short talks from abstracts in mid-April and ask that applicants who would like their abstract to be considered for a talk submit their application by April 15^th 2009.