Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology

Jill Lens, PhD
Dorothy M. Willie Professor in Excellence, College of Law; University of Iowa

Stillbirth: The Experience, and the Laws that Frame it

**Please note this takes place in 180 Bevier Hall, 905 S Goodwin Ave**

Wade Zeno, PhD
Mork Family Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science
University of Southern California

"Exploring Intrinsic Disorder at the Protein-Lipid Interface"

**Please note this takes place in 180 Bevier Hall, 905 S Goodwin Ave**

Ink the Brain is a free 90-minute workshop for ages 7-15 where you can enjoy creating an image of a neuron using pen and ink as you learn about the brain, the history of science and the famous work of early neuroscientist Ramón y Cajal. Our artist/scientist team will be present to guide you to get comfortable with the art materials, discuss the scientific inspiration for these images, and give your creativity space to take off! All art materials will be provided. This program is sponsored in part by an Urbana Arts and Culture Grant.

Owen Ryan, PhD
Director of Cell Engineering Research at ADM

"An adventure in yeast synthetic biology and industrial biotechnology"

Enjoy creating an image of a neuron using pen and ink as you learn about the brain, the history of science and the famous work of early neuroscientist Ramón y Cajal. Our artist and scientist team will be present to guide you, discuss the scientific inspiration for these images, and give your creativity the space to take off! All art materials will be provided. This program is sponsored in part by an Urbana Arts Grant

"The Magic of RNA: New Medicines, Immortality, and the Power to Control Evolution"

Thomas R. Cech, PhD
Nobel Laureate
Distinguished Professor of Biochemistry
Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute
BioFrontiers Institute
University of Colorado Boulder

I-Hotel and Conference Center 

Reception and book signing to follow. 

Thomas Cech was born in Chicago and grew up in Iowa City. As a child, Cech collected rocks and minerals and would "talk" science with his father and professors at the University of Iowa. In 1966, Cech went to Grinnell College to study chemistry - a subject he really enjoyed. College was a real eye-opener as he met others who were just as excited about academics as he was. He would have stayed in chemistry, but as an undergraduate, Cech worked at Argonne National Laboratory and at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory. These research experiences made him realize that it just took too long to gather meaningful data for a chemistry experiment.

In 1970, Cech headed for the University of California at Berkeley for graduate work. Here he discovered the world of molecular biology. As he says, he "was thrilled with the much more rapid interplay between idea and experimental test that was possible in this field," and he "became committed to the interface between molecular biology and chemistry." Cech finished his PhD thesis on DNA chromosome structure and then went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for post doctoral work.

In 1978, Cech accepted a position in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Colorado Boulder. It was here that he and his research group did the work leading to the discovery that RNA can self-splice and thus can act as a ribozyme. For this discovery, Cech shared the 1989 Nobel Prize for Chemistry with Sidney Altman.

In 1988, Cech became an Investigator for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and in 2000, assumed duties as the President of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Among his many honors and awards, Cech received the 1995 National Medal of Science.

(A)ll (G)amers (C)ome (U)nwind with RNA Trivia Night at 25 O’Clock Brewing Company.

Come for the drinks and stay for the nerdy science trivia. 

Teams of up to 6, free to play, prizes for the winners.

"Decoding 12 million years of Amazonian plant diversity using zero-shot segmentation and classification of fossil pollen on microscope slides"

Surangi W. Punyasena, Professor - Plant Biology

Sandeep Puthanveetil Satheesan, Sr. Research Software Engineer - Supercomputing Applications; 

Shu Kong

THIS SEMINAR HAS MOVED TO THE ACES HERITAGE ROOM

Accommodations

For all IGB events, gender neutral bathrooms are available on floors 1 and 2 of the IGB gatehouse, open during the hours of 8am to12pm and 1pm to 5pm. A private lactation room for IGB-affiliated members is available by request, see the IGB reception desk for access. Baby changing stations are available in the restrooms on the concourse level. For specific needs, please contact facilities@igb.illinois.edu