Keynote and Symposia
2023 Keynote
Saturday, December 2, 4:30 pm EST
Cell Biologists and Climate Change: What Can Cell Biologists Do to Address Climate-Scale Problems?




Natalie Kofler
Founder, Editing Nature and Senior Advisor, Scientific Citizenship Initiative, Harvard Medical School
Manu Prakash
Associate Professor of Bioengineering, Stanford University
Daniel Goodwin
Founding Co-Director, Homeworld Collective
Schmidt Climate Innovation Fellow
Moderated by:
Jing-Ke Weng
Director, Institute for Plant-Human Interface
Professor of Chemistry, Chemical Biology, and Bioengineering
Northeastern University
The speakers will each deliver a short talk followed by an interactive and moderated panel discussion led by Jing-Ke Weng from Northeastern University.
If you have questions for the panelists, please submit them no later than November 29 by clicking here.
2022 Symposia
In addition to the invited speakers listed below, two trainees (postdoctoral researchers and/or graduate students) will be selected from the top-scoring submitted abstracts to present in each Symposia. Submit your abstract by the August 2 deadline for talk consideration in a Symposia.
Cellular and Organelle Movement during Health and Disease
Sunday, December 4, 2022, 9:15 am to 11:00 am
Tracks: Communal Cell; and Cells in Distress and Disease

University of California, Davis
Tubb3 Mediates Cadherin Localization To Control Ectodermal Proliferation, Migration, And Differentiation

Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG), Barcelona
Mechano-control of Cell and Tissue Plasticity in the Early Embryo
Trainee Talks:
Christopher J. Obara
HHMI, Ashburn, VA
Motion of Single Molecular Tethers Reveals Dynamic Subdomains at ER-mitochondria Contact Sites.
Valentina Štimac
Rudjer Boskovic Institute, Zagreb, Croatia
Microtubule Pivoting Ensures Passage of Polar Chromosomes across the Centrosome Required for Timely Alignment
**Developmental Plasticity and Regeneration
Sunday, December 4, 2022, 9:15 am to 11:00 am
Track: Communal Cell

University of South Carolina
Ovarian Stem Cell Regulation By Adipocyte Nutrient Sensing

Imperial College, London
The Sex And Geometry Of Inter-organ Communication
Trainee Talks:
Lydia Grmai
University of Pittsburgh
Stress Response Signaling as a Metabolic Sensor for Reproduction
Ida Jentoft
Max Planck Institute for Multidisciplinary Sciences, Göttingen, Germany
New Insights into Cytoplasmic Lattices in Mammalian Oocytes
Environmental Change and Cell Biology
Monday, December 5, 2022, 9:15 am to 11:00 am
Track: Specialized Cell and Evolution

University of Hawaiʻi Mānoa
Community-embedded Systems Microbiology in Indigenous Spaces

Grinnell College
Shaping Up And Responding: Color Vision And Light-dependent Developmental Plasticity In Cyanobacteria
Trainee Talks:
Kavita Rangan
University of California, San Diego
RNA Recoding in Cephalopods Tailors Microtubule Motor Protein Function
Juan Reyna Pacheco
San José State University
Increased Intracellular pH Promotes Cell Death in the Developing Drosophila Eye
Extracellular Vesicles and Their Roles in Development and Disease
Monday, December 5, 2022, 9:15 am to 11:00 am
Tracks: Cellular Dynamics; and Cells in Distress and Disease

Tokyo Institute of Technology
Role Of Extracellular Vesicle Proteins In Disease Etiology And Detection

Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot
The Networking Platform of the Malaria Parasite
Trainee Talks:
Maria Fernanda Forni
Yale University
Metabolic Crosstalk in the Wound Bed: A New Role for Adipocytes during Healing
Kehinde Babatunde
University of Calgary, Calgary
Malaria Derived Extracellular Vesicles Inhibit Primary Neutrophils Reactive Oxygen Species Production and Neutrophil Extracellular Trap Formation
How Structure Enables Function in Differentiated Cell Types
Tuesday, December 6, 2022, 9:15 am to 11:00 am
Tracks: Specialized Cell and Evolution; and Communal Cell

Duke University
Neuronal Mitochondrial Regulation In Health And Disease

National Centre for Biological Sciences, India
Spatial Organization Of Lipid Metabolism Tunes Signal Transduction In Drosophila Photoreceptors
Trainee Talks:
Pavan Vedula
University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia
The Role of Evolutionary Amino Acid Conservation in Cytoplasmic Actin Function
Madeline Keenen
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Transcriptional Heterogeneity in the Giant, Multinucleated Placenta Syncytiotrophoblast Cell
Metabolism from Cells to Organisms
Tuesday, December 6, 2022, 9:15 am to 11:00 am
Tracks: Signaling and Metabolism; and Cellular Dynamics

Stanford University
The Biochemical Basis Of The Lysosomal Dysfunction In Early-onset Neurodegeneration

University of California, San Diego
A Erad Independent Role For Rhomboid Pseudoprotease Dfm1 In Mediating Sphingolipid Homeostasis
Trainee Talks:
Julia Spear
University of Notre Dame
Single-cell Intracellular pH Dynamics Regulate the Cell Cycle by Timing G1 Exit, S Phase Duration, and G2 Entry
Natalie Speer
UT Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas
Identification of a Novel Regulator of Triglyceride Lipolysis that Localizes to a Specific Sub-population of Yeast Lipid Droplets
Cellular Changes to Host and Pathogen during Infection
Wednesday, December 7, 2022, 11:00 am to 12:45 pm
Tracks: Cells in Distress and Disease

Santa Clara University
When Toxoplasma Met Enterocyte...

Virginia Tech
Protein and Membrane Interactions in Positive-Strand RNA Virus Genome Replication
Trainee Talks:
Kiranmai Joshi
National Institute of Animal Biotechnology, Hyderabad, India
The Intracellular Bacterial Ppathogen, BrucellaTargets Host Deubiquitin Protease through the Effector Protein, TcpB for Facilitating Infection of Macrophages
Cuong Tran
University of California, Berkeley
The Rickettsial Effector RickA Contributes to Cell-to-Cell Spread
New Organisms; New Directions
Wednesday, December 7, 2022, 11:00 am to 12:45 pm
Tracks: Specialized Cell and Evolution; and Signaling and Metabolism

Cornell University
Rewiring Death: Understanding The Circuitry Regulating Dna Damage And Apoptosis In Planarian Stem Cells

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Tardigrades As A Model To Understand How Biological Materials Can Survive Extremes
Trainee Talks:
Ben Larson*
University of California, San Francisco
Integrating Cellular Structure, Dynamics, and Decision Making to Investigate Principles of Cellular Behavior in a Unicellular Walker
Alice Accorsi
Stowers Inst Medical Research, Kansas City
Pomacea canaliculata: New Research Organism to Study Complete Camera-type Eye Regeneration
* Ben Larson is the 2022 Postdoc Recipient of the Porter Prize for Excellence in Research
** Heinz Herrmann Symposium. Heinz Herrmann was Professor Emeritus of Molecular and Cell Biology at the University of Connecticut. A symposium in his honor was endowed at the ASCB in 1990. A founder of the ASCB, Professor Herrmann was well known for his pioneering approach to research in developmental biology, which has led to over 100 publications. He also wrote two books—Cell Biology and From Biology to Sociopolitics.