PlantBio17 Day 2 Recap

Day 2 in Honolulu, Hawaii was full of hard choices.

 

The day started at 7 am with both the Women in Plant Biology breakfast and the Undergraduate Poster Session running concurrently. Both events were immensely successful. The quality of research presented by the undergraduates of ASPB is incredible! These budding plant scientists will ensure the future is bright.

The first concurrent session of the day took us on a journey through time, examining evolution in plants. John Bowman, Monash University, discussed the genes regulating haploid to diploid life cycle changes from Chlamydomonas to land plants. Marja Timmermans, University of Tuebingen, demonstrated how gradients of miRNA determine top versus bottom leaf polarity. Keiko Torii, University of Washington, explained the 3 steps required to differentiate stomata and the 2 steps required for proper spacing of stomata within pavement cells. Liam Dolan, Oxford University, uses liverworts to examine how rhizoids evolved.

In the mid-morning to early afternoon several workshops were running, including ABC’s (Analysis, Bioinformatics, and Computation) in the Classroom, Developing an International Research Collaboration, Plant Direct: New Journal, New Ideas, and the Minority Affairs Committee Luncheon. While I did not personally attend any of these, I heard from both Twitter and discussions that they were all excellent!

The afternoon brought about our first set of concurrent sessions
Concurrent sessions are nice because they give more opportunity for oral presentations, but they leave you with really hard choices about which one to attend! Thankfully, we have Twitter and many of these sessions were covered. The topics for the early afternoon concurrent sessions were Responses to Abiotic Signals and Stress, Epigenetics: Development and Defense, Root Development Under Stress, Nutrient Transport, and Evolution of Land Plants. See what I mean about really hard choices?! I would like to point out that the Responses to Abiotic Signals and Stress session was sponsored by the Minority Affairs Committee and featured all minority speakers. It was stupendous! Every talk was exquisite. The late afternoon concurrent sessions were: Plant-Animal Interaction, Regulation and Transcriptional Networks, Whole Plant Ecology/Ecophysiology, Calcium signaling in Abiotic Stress, and Cell Biology.

I would like to point out that the Responses to Abiotic Signals and Stress session was sponsored by the Minority Affairs Committee and featured all minority speakers. It was stupendous! Every talk was exquisite. The late afternoon concurrent sessions were: Plant-Animal Interaction, Regulation and Transcriptional Networks, Whole Plant Ecology/Ecophysiology, Calcium signaling in Abiotic Stress, and Cell Biology.

The Exhibitor Hall officially opened today, bringing with it plenty of swag! The night rounded out with the poster session. Walking around the poster session everyone was engaged in lively conversations with their colleagues. With about 1000 posters on display, the amount of information likely exchanged in an hour and a half is mind blowing!

All of the action on Twitter has been put in a Storify for easy reading. There you will find Rishi Masalia’s Periscope videos, live tweeting from the sessions, the excitement of the Exhibitor Hall, and more!

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