The Social Biology of Microbial Communities: Workshop Summary (2012)

DAY 1: TUESDAY, MARCH 6, 2012

8:30-9:00:

Registration & Continental Breakfast

9:00-9:15:

Welcoming remarks: David Relman, James Hughes, and Lonnie King

9:15-10:00:

KEYNOTE: Sociomicrobiology: Quorum sensing, biofilms, and territoriality

E. Peter Greenberg, University of Washington Moderator: David Relman

10:00-10:30:

DISCUSSION

10:30-10:45:

BREAK

SESSION I: Formation and Function of Microbial Communities
Moderator: Jacque Fletcher

10:45-11:15:

Symbiont community complexity: The fungal gardens of leafcutter ants

Cameron R. Currie, University of Wisconsin–Madison

11:15-11:45:

The role of oxygen in shaping the structure and function of microbial communities

Thomas M. Schmidt, Michigan State University

11:45-12:15:

Source-sink dynamics: Marine invertebrate-associated and free-living chemosynthetic symbionts

Colleen Cavanaugh, Harvard University

12:15-1:00:

DISCUSSION

1:00-1:45:

LUNCH

SESSION II: Factors Contributing to Community Stability
Moderator: David Relman

1:45-2:15:

Social evolutionary theory, cooperation, and the expression of virulence in microbial communities

Sam Brown, University of Edinburgh

2:15-2:45:

Ecological factors and processes during evolutionary transitions in Darwinian individuality

Paul Rainey, New Zealand Institute for Advanced Study & Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology

2:45-3:15:

Evolution of cooperation and control of cheating in the social amoeba: Dictyostelium discoideum

Joan E. Strassmann, Washington University

3:15-3:45:

BREAK

3:45-4:15:

Swarming bacteria as freight haulage systems

Colin J. Ingham, Wageningen University

4:15-4:45:

Emergence and robustness of multicellular behavior in bacteria

Joao Xavier, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center

4:45-5:15:

Mathematical and computational challenges in the study of complex adaptive systems

Simon A. Levin, Princeton University

5:15-6:00:

DISCUSSION

6:00-6:15:

CONCLUDING REMARKS

6:15:

ADJOURN DAY ONE

DAY 2: WEDNESDAY, MARCH 7, 2012

8:30-9:00:

Registration & Continental Breakfast

9:00-9:15:

Summary of Day One: David Relman

9:15-10:00:

KEYNOTE: Glowing corpses & radiant excrement: The role of bioluminescence in microbial communities

Edith Widder, Ocean Research & Conservation Association Moderator: Lonnie King

10:00-10:30:

DISCUSSION

10:30-10:45:

BREAK

SESSION III: Community Adaptation and Response to Environmental Stimuli
Moderator: David Rizzo

10:45-11:15:

Interspecies interactions among rhizosphere and soil bacteria

Jo Handelsman, Yale University

11:15-11:45:

Contact dependent mechanisms of communication in bacteria

David Low, University of California, Santa Barbara

11:45-12:15:

Interactions between symbiotic microbes, their mammalian host, and invading pathogens

Vanessa Sperandio, The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center

12:15-12:45:

DISCUSSION

12:45-1:30:

LUNCH

SESSION IV: What More Do We Need to Know about Microbial Community Dynamics?
Moderator: Carole Heilman

1:30-2:00:

Phylogenetic and phylogenomic approaches to studies of microbial communities

Jonathan Eisen, University of California, Davis

2:00-2:30:

Discovery and applications of the metabolic diversity of microbial communities

Jared R. Leadbetter, California Institute of Technology

2:30-3:00:

Statistical tools for integrating community networks, spatial and clinical data

Susan Holmes, Stanford University

3:00-3:30:

Microbial community assembly and dynamics: From acidophilic biofilms to the premature infant gut

Jill Banfield, University of California, Berkeley

3:30-4:00:

Human-microbe mutualism in health and disease

David A. Relman, Stanford University

4:00-4:30:

DISCUSSION

4:30-4:45:

CONCLUDING REMARKS

4:45:

ADJOURN DAY TWO