30,000 years in a halite crystal? Holy cow.

Labels: microbes, salt

Nora Noffke asked me to help get the word out about this cool conference... Here you go:
-CB

Microbial Mats in siliciclastic sediments from the Archean to present

May 21 - 23, 2010
Denver and Dinosaur Ridge, Colorado

Convenors:
Nora Noffke, Old Dominion University
Henry Chafetz, University of Houston

This inaugural conference presents an important geobiological review on microbial mats and the sedimentary structures they form in siliciclastic settings through Earth’s history, from the early Archean to the present. The meeting brings together an international panel of leading researchers to provide a state-of-the art overview of this field. This meeting is essential for all scientists interested in this rapidly growing field.The conference discusses modern microbial mats constructed by benthic cyanobacteria and other microbiota in aquatic settings. It will:

• explore the processes of microbial interaction with physical sedimentary processes;
• give an overview on the taxonomy;
• discuss the relation of the siliciclastic biogenic structures to stromatolites and;
• their distribution through time.

Topics include:

• early life,
• the rise of cyanobacteria,
• the evolution of microbial eukaryotes,
• the biological transformation at the terminal Precambrian,
• taphonomy of Ediacara fossils,
• influence of macroorganisms on microbial mats,
• extinction patterns, and
• stratigraphical significance

PROGRAM :
The conference will consist of talks, posters, and a field trip to Dinosaur Ridge.

Abstract submission:
The program includes talks of each 20 minutes and 5 minutes discussion, as well as poster presentations in the afternoon. If you are interested in a presentation, please submit your abstract for either talk or poster to Nora Noffke (nnoffke@odu.edu) or Henry Chafetz (hchafetz@uh.edu).

Abstracts should be unformatted. Abstracts are limited to ten authors, 100 or fewer characters in the title (including spaces), and 2,000 or fewer characters of body text (including spaces).
Authors will be notified via email of acceptance or rejection. Accepted abstracts will appear in the research conference abstracts volume.

Following acceptance, authors may wish to submit an optional extended abstract. Submission guidelines for the extended abstract will be supplied with abstract acceptance. The submission of abstracts opens September 1st 2009, and closes December 1st 2009. The notification of acceptance will be sent during December.

Special Publication:A SEPM Special Publication is planned for selected papers on this topic. Contributions to this volume are not restricted to participants at the conference. Please send an abstract of an intended manuscript to either Nora Noffke or Henry Chafetz. Invited manuscripts will be accepted until June 30, 2010 (firm deadline).

Labels: colorado, conferences, microbes, stromatolites

Bonnie Bassler, whose TED talk I featured here on Sunday, will be speaking Thursday evening at the Carnegie Institution in northwest DC, as part of their "Capitol Science" lecture series. As in the TED talk, she will be discussing "Cell-to-Cell Communication in Bacteria." The talk begins at 6:45pm. Enjoy!
Hat tip to Diego H. for letting me know about this!

Labels: dc, meetings, microbes

An amazing talk that includes terrific examples of good techniques for delivering a good talk: simple, elegant slides; extemporaneous speaking; humor; analogies; a trajectory of thought. Plus, the actual content is amazing. Check it out:

Labels: microbes, microscopy

A quick note here, just for the sake of completeness, on my final MSSE class of the summer: "Examining Life in Extreme Environments." This was a cool class, but structured in a different way from my other MSSE courses: it was set up more like a conference, with a variety of different speakers on different topics, interspersed with activities. The organizers, Susan Kelly and Monica Brelsford used a grant from NASA to help fund the course, which meant they had the money to fly speakers in from NASA Ames, the University of New Mexico, and the Wrigley Marine Science Center on Catalina Island, California. We also had a presentation piped in from Woods Hole. The goal of the class was to look at living organisms that manage to survive in 'extreme' environments, like really salty, really hot, really cold, really acidic, and so forth. Why study these bacteria and archaea? We're hoping they will give us insights into (a) the origins of life on Earth, and (b) the possibility of life on other planets or moons elsewhere in the universe. We had a field trip to Yellowstone National Park to look at microbial mats; we looked at cultures of hyperthermophiles; we listened to excellent talks by Mark Young (viruses as a source of genetic diversity), Ed Adams (new subzero lab tour), and Robert Szilagyi (thermodynamics of the origin of life). As you can see, it was pretty diverse -- all week long, always something new and interesting. I really enjoyed it!

Labels: archean, astronomy, cold, hot springs, microbes, montana, msse, wyoming, yellowstone