SDB 74th Annual Meeting Report
Society for Developmental Biology 74th Annual Meeting
Snowbird, Utah, July 9-13, 2015
(Click Images to Enlarge)
Full Abstracts with Author Index
The Numbers
Total attendance was 612 people from 21 different countries. There were 297 faculty/staff, 83 postdoctoral fellows, 219 students and 13 exhibitors. 422 abstracts were submitted, of which 343 were poster presentations. 1 op-ed was written by Joseph Yost (University of Utah) about the SDB annual meeting and funding for developmental biology research was published in the Salt Lake Tribune.
2015 SDB Awards
 | Edwin G. Conklin Medal - Michael Levine, Princeton University |
 | Developmental Biology-SDB Lifetime Achievement Award - Brigid Hogan, Duke University |
 | Viktor Hamburger Outstanding Educator Prize - Kathryn Tosney, University of Miami |
BSDB Exchange
| SDB hosted the British Society for Developmental Biology's 2015 best student poster competition winner, Wendy X. Gu of the University of Cambridge (UK). She presented The role of Wnt5 ligand and the Ryk family Wnt receptors in positioning neurites along the antero-posterior axis of the developing Drosophila ventral nerve cord (Abstract #263). SDB's 2015 best student poster winner Valeria Yartseva of Yale University will present her winning poster at the next spring BSDB meeting. This is a longtime exchange between the two societies. |
Paul D. Henion Graduate Student Travel Award
 | Aparna Mahadevan of Cornell University was the recipient of the first Paul D. Henion Graduate Student Travel Award. The award provided $500 travel assistance to Aparna, a post-candidacy graduate student, to attend the meeting and present her work Pitx2 drives organ-specific arterial and lymphatic vascularization of the midgut. (Abstract #187) |
Best Postdoctoral Presentation at Hilde Mangold Postdoctoral Symposium
 | Peter Walentek, UC Berkeley. Prize - Travel Award to Meeting/Course of Choice sponsored by Aquarius Fish Systems, LLC. A ciliary inhibitor is required for ciliogenesis - fine tuning Cp110 levels during development and function of multiciliated cells. (Abstract #36) |
Best Student Poster Competition
Undergraduate Winners
1st: Autumn McKnite, Univ. of Utah. Prize - $200 from SDB. Molecular interplay between BMP4 and Fibrillin in embryonic development and Marfan syndrome. (Abstract #413)
2nd: Andrew Halleran, College of William and Mary. Prize - $100 from SDB. Global Transcriptomic Analysis of Compensatory Response to Genetic Perturbation of the Notch Signaling Pathway. (Abstract #345)
Honorable Mentions: Benjamin Walker, Roanoke College. Atrazine Affects Craniofacial Chondrogenesis in Zebrafish (Danio rerio) (Abstract #168) and Catrina Johnson, Univ. of Maryland, Baltimore County. Investigating the Role of HIF1-a in Anoxia Tolerance in Zebrafish Embryos. (Abstract #227) Prizes - Books donated by Elsevier and Sinauer.
2nd: Jonathan Wilde, Univ. of Colorado, Denver. Prize - $1000 genesis award. GCN5 restricts diencephalic size via a novel mechanism of retinoic acid signaling. (Abstract #360)
3rd: Lauren Shipp, Univ. of California San Diego. Prize - $300 SDB award. The ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporter ABCC5a controls cyclic nucleotide mediated invagination in sea urchin. (Abstract #121)
Honorable Mentions: Saptaparni Bandyopadhyay, Univ. of Miami. Cdx4 transcription factor controls the ‘determination front’ rather than the ‘segmentation clock’ during somitogenesis. (Abstract #354); Jonathan Cook, Univ. of Colorado, Denver. Zygote arrest (Zar) proteins regulate mRNA translation and disrupt formation of the translation initiation complex. (Abstract #233); Aparna Mahadevan, Cornell Univ. Pitx2 drives organ-specific arterial and lymphatic vascularization of the midgut. (Abstract #187); Sree Deepthi Muthukrishnan, Univ. of Maine. Concurrent BMP7 and FGF9 signaling governs AP-1 function to promote nephron progenitor self-renewal. (Abstract #157); Nathaniel Peters, Univ. of Washington. Dynamin-mediated endocytosis is required for tube closure, cell intercalation, and biased apical expansion during epithelial tubulogensis in the Drosophila ovary. (Abstract #299); and Charles Yi, Univ. of California, Irvine. Analysis of the function of FNDC3A in mouse spermatogenesis. (Abstract #319) Prizes - Books donated by Elsevier and Sinauer.
Choose Development!
A Choose Development! workshop was held Thursday, July 9 for the fellows and mentors.
Choose Development! Workshop
Choose Development! Fellows presented their summer research at the SDB 74th Annual Meeting. Several fellows created videos about their research experience.
 Choose Development! Fellows |  Choose Development! Fellows at Poster Session |
Photos from Meeting
 
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| Presidential Symposium: Lee Niswander and Mario Capecchi |
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| Sara Roberson, Abhijeet Sharma, and Ida Chow presenting posters. | ||
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| Education Panel: Karen Weintraub, Chanda Jefferson, Nocola Barber, Jennifer Zeitzer | Chanda Jefferson, Martin Chalfie, and Karen Weintraub | Post Board Meeting Hike: Martin Chalfie, Blanche Capel, Robb Krumlauf, Mark Van Doren |
Awards Banquet
Participants sang "The Day the Funding Died". The lyrics were written by Carole LaBonne and is sung to the tune of "American Pie" by Don McLean. See lyrics here. The band Jersey Street provided musical accompaniment. Video is courtesy of Prem Yadav.