Biophysical Newsletter - June 2014

12

BIOPHYSICAL SOCIETY NEWSLETTER

2014

JUNE

Subgroups

molecular dynamics simulations to obtain mem- brane structural information such as area per lipid molecule. Tim Salditt presented x-ray diffraction studies of fusion stalk formation in dehydrated lipid mixtures to characterize the energetic driving

MSAS A Report on the MSAS Subgroup Meeting in San Francisco

forces in SNARE-mediated fusion. The Thomas E. Thompson Award was presented to Sarah L. Keller for her contribution to the fun- damental understanding of lipid mixture phase behavior and ther- modynamics. Her talk, titled Some of My Greatest Mistakes was a tongue-in-cheek look at the

This year’s Membrane Structure and Assembly Subgroup (MSAS) symposium in San Francisco was devoted to a variety of aspects, mostly in the frontiers between biophysics and other sciences, such as microbiology, cell biology, and physics. For the first time we had a full-day symposium, which was very well attended from the first lecture to the last. The morning session started with a presentation by William Dowhan , based on his studies on lipid-protein interactions in bacterial membranes, on how lipids can determine protein structure. This was followed by a talk by Arne Gericke on how lipids mediate PTEN tumor sup- pressor function. One of the presentations con- necting cell biology and biophysics was given by Ana J. García-Sáez who described her studies on mitochondrial permeabilization in apoptosis. The cellular/molecular interface was also explored by Banafshe Larijani who showed her results on the effects of phosphoinositides and their derivatives on endomembrane morphology and function. The morning session ended with Robert V. Stahelin’s presentation on the molecular basis of the as- sembly and budding of the Ebola virus from the plasma membrane of human cells. In the afternoon Rumiana Dimova showed that AC and DC electric fields can be used to deform, po- rate, and precisely fuse giant vesicles. Anna Shnyro- va demonstrated that lipid nanotubes pulled from black lipid membranes can be used to study the interplay of dynamin assembly and membrane fis- sion. Next, Viola Vogel presented her nanotechnol- ogy-based work on how macrophages lift bacteria from surfaces through synchronization of the mo- tions and tensions applied by filopodia and lamel- lipodia. John Katsaras explained the advantages of combining neutron and x-ray scattering data with

Sarah Keller

connection between ideas and discovery highlight- ing some key publications from the Keller labora- tory. The award money of $ 1,000, as well as the symposium as a whole, were sponsored by Avanti Polar Lipids. All colleagues who are interested in our field are invited to be part of our community and asked to support it by being members of the subgroup. As this report is going to the printer the election of the 2016 MSAS chair is taking place, we congratu- late the elected person and thank all the candidates who agreed to run. Many thanks also to sponsors, members, and all attendees. We hope to see you in Baltimore next year! — Felix M. Goñi and Marjorie Longo , former and current MSAS Chair BIV After hosting a successful 4 th symposium at the recent Biophysical Society Meeting in San Fran- cisco, the BIV subgroup is excited to bring to your attention a few other worldwide events that provide further platforms for exciting discussions on how biomolecular processes inside the cell dif- fer from conventional in vitro experiments. These events will bring together researchers with diverse Upcoming Conferences Highlighting Biopolymers In Vivo (BIV) Themes