EU-US Workshop on

"Dynamics of DNA repair enzymes involved in nucleotide excision repair and inter-strand crosslink repair: from molecules to man”

Smolenice Castle, Slovakia, May 23-27, 2010

The purpose of this workshop is to bring together scientists from the EU and US together in a lovely and intimate setting of Smolenice Castle, Slovakia, to discuss our current understanding of how protein machines assemble and sort through genomic DNA for specific damaged sites which are repaired through nucleotide excision repair or inter-strand crosslink repair. Many endogenous agents, environmental toxicants and chemotherapeutic agents cause DNA damage that is repaired through these two pathways. DNA damage recognition and repair is a dynamic process that spans time scales over several orders of magnitudes and the study of which uses a wide range of tools, including: molecular dynamics, NMR spectroscopy, X-ray crystallography, light and atomic force microscopy through to genetics, classic biochemistry and confocal in vivo imaging techniques. The workshop will move from molecules to man and include a discussion of several syndromes associated with premature aging and cancer and caused by poor repair of these damage substrates. The main objective of this workshop is to fully address the problem of “damage recognition” involved in nucleotide excision repair and inter-strand crosslink repair by generating an understanding of the current state of the science and then articulate where the science will go if current technical and scientific hurdles are overcome. The main goals of this workshop are to: 1) highlight the state of the science and current technologies being used to study this problem; 2) exchange ideas between scientists in the EU and US; and 3) provide a forum that allows scientists in the local region an opportunity to meet and engage with scientists from the EU and US who are driving the field.

Presentations will be featured in a special edition of the journal, DNA repair to be published later this year.