Due to the diverse and widespread effects of epigenetic modifications, it is becoming increasingly evident that key questions in these fields cannot be tackled by specialists from a single discipline alone, but require a broad expertise from different fields. Our symposium (funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, DFG) therefore brings together world leaders working on a wide range of topics —epigenetics, chromatin biology and the regulation of gene transcription, stem cell biology, cellular differentiation and reprogramming, developmental genetics, DNA repair, immunology and cancer research — with the aim of integrating these different approaches. An important focus of the symposium will be the latest advances in understanding key molecular mechanisms relevant to these areas and how they integrate with related processes. It is this interdisciplinary approach that ensures a niche for our symposium and has allowed us to attract the leading representatives from the respective disciplines as speakers. Crucially, the symposium will bring together leading experts in epigenetics research and DNA repair, two areas which have only recently been shown to be interrelated. We expect the combination of topics at the very forefront of biomedical research and outstanding speakers to result in a highly interesting symposium, which is relevant to a wide audience.

Invited speakers:

Prof. Dr. Frederick W. Alt, Children's Hospital Boston, USA

Prof. Dr. Bradley Cairns, HHMI Huntsman Cancer Institute, Utah, USA

Prof. Dr. Ingrid Grummt, DKFZ, Heidelberg, Germany

Prof. Dr. John Gurdon, The Wellcome Trust/Cancer Research UK Gurdon Institute of Cancer and Developmental Biology, University of Cambridge, UK

Prof. Dr. Rudolf Jaenisch, Whitehead Institute, MIT, Cambridge, USA

Prof. Dr. Stefan Jentsch, Max-Planck Institute of Biochemistry, Martinsried/Munich, Germany

Prof. Dr. Josef Jiricny, Institute of Molecular Cancer Research, University of Zurich, Switzerland

Prof. Dr. Renato Paro, D-BSSE, ETH Zurich, Basel, Switzerland

Prof. Dr. Alex Schier, Harvard University, Boston, USA

Prof. Dr. Ernst-Ludwig Winnacker, Secretary General, HFSP, Strasbourg, France