Konstanz Symposium Chemical Biology 2015

8-9 October 2015, University of Konstanz

The third Konstanz Symposium Chemical Biology took place on 8-9 October 2015 at the University of Konstanz. The symposium features hot topics within highly relevant areas of chemical biology. Leading scientists in the field address current and future developments. One of the main aims is, however, to bring our doctoral students in touch with senior scientists and researchers known worldwide.

In 2015, the Symposium was organised along with the first Autumn School Chemical Biology. Three courses (Combinatorial and High Throughput Technologies, Computational Life Science, Bioconjugation Chemistry) preceded the conference. Graduate students from all over the world joined the event and contributed to an intensive exchange of scientific work.

Conference Programme

Thursday, 8 October 2015

09:00 -09:10 Welcome: Andreas Marx

Session I Chair: Elisa May

09:10 -09:50 Ben G. Davis, University of Oxford: Sugars and Proteins: Towards a Synthetic Biology (Abstract)

09:50 -10:30 Ernst H.K. Stelzer, Goethe-University Frankfurt am Main: The Light Sheet as a Basis for Perfectly Corrected , Sensor-Based and Fully Automated Microscopy (Abstract)

11:00 -11:40 Chris Meier, University of Hamburg: Developing Prodrugs of Antivirally Active Nucleoside Triphosphates - Against all Odds - It Works! (Abstract)

11:40 -12:20 Stephen Taylor, University of Manchester: How do Cells React When Mitosis Goes Wrong? (Abstract)

12:20 -13:00 Short Talks (Leila Motiei, Saurav Malhotra, Sabrina Weickert, Franziska Doll)- Abstracts Short Talks

Session II Chair: Daniel Summerer

14:00 -14:40 Georg Pohnert, Friedrich Schiller Universität Jena: Exploration of Chemical Signals from Marine Plankton that Structure the Marine Environment (Abstract)

14:40 -15:20 Wenshe Liu, Texas A&M University: Use Structurally Defined Nucleosomes to Profile Epigenetic Targets of Histone Lysine Deacylases and Demethylases (Abstract)

15:20 -15:40 Short Talks (Grzegorz Kubik, Sandra Hess)- Abstract Short Talks

Session III Chair: Karin Hauser

16:10 -16:50 Dirk Trauner, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München: Controlling Biological Function with Photopharmacology (Abstract)

16:50 -17:30 Sheena E. Radford, University of Leeds: Biophysical Studies of Amyloid Formation and its Inhibition (Abstract)

17:30 -17:50 Short Talks (Andreas Groß, Nassima Meriem Gueddouda)- Abstracts Short Talks

18:00 Dinner & Postersession

Friday, 9 October 2015

Session IV Chair: Thomas U. Mayer

09:10 -09:50 Tom W. Muir, Princeton University: 'Houdini' Proteins: Discovery and Applications of Ultrafast Inteins (Abstract)

09:50 -10:30 Erich A. Nigg, Biozentrum, University of Basel: Control of Mitotic Chromosome Segregation by Cooperating Protein Kinases (Abstract)

11:00 -11:40 Short Talks (Christoph Paone, Nemanja Milisavljevic, Michele Felletti, Xiaohui Zhao)- Abstracts Short Talks

Session V Chair: Andreas Marx

13:00 -13:40 Elena Dubikovskaya, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne: Real-Time Imaging of Enzymatic Activity and Metabolite Absorption (Abstract)

13:40 -14:20 Petra Schwille, Max-Planck-Institute of Biochemistry, Martinsried: Synthetic Biology of Cell Division (Abstract)

14:20 -15:00 Benjamin F. Cravatt, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla: Activity-Based Proteomics - Applications for Enzyme and Inhibitor Discovery (Abstract)

15:00 Concluding Remarks & Poster Prize Awarding

Autumn School - Course Programme

Monday, 5 October 2015: Combinatorial and High Throughput Technologies

9 h - Thomas U. Mayer: Pros and Cons of in Vitro and Cellular Screens, Setup of Screens

10:30 h - Silke Müller: Presentation of the Screening Facility

12:30 h - Valentin Wittmann: Introduction to Combinatorial Chemistry, Preparation and Screening of Peptide, Small Molecule, and Nucleic Acid Libraries

14 h - Andreas Marx: Directed Protein Evolution 15 h Coffee Break

15:30 h - Michael Strerath, Bayer HealthCare: High Throughput Technologies Enabling Antibody Lead Discovery and Optimization

Tuesday, 6 October 2015: Computational Life Science

9 h - Kay Diederichs: Experimental Structure Analysis

11 h - Michael Berthold: Molecular Data Analysis with KNIME

14 h - Tancred Frickey: Sequence Analysis and Modeling

16 h - Q&A

Wednesday, 7 October 2015: Bioconjugation Chemistry

10 h - Andreas Marx: Introduction to Bioconjugation Chemistry, Applications in Nucleic Acid Chemistry

13 h - Valentin Wittmann: Applications in Protein and Carbohydrate Chemistry

14:30 h - Q&A

15:30 h - Ben Davis, University of Oxford: Sugars and Proteins

17 h - Johanna Kastl, Amgen Research GmbH: High-Throughput Screening in Drug Discovery