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Epigenetic Inheritance

Impact for Biology and Society

Below you find the past Epigenetic Inheritance symposia, organized by Isabelle Mansuy, dedicated to the theme of epigenetic inheritance, a discipline at the interface between biology, medicine and environmental science that studies how life experiences and environmental factors modify the organism across generations. For every symposium, Isabelle gathers leaders from different disciplines working on epigenetic inheritance, to cover aspects from behavior to metabolism in humans and animal models. The symposium features keynote lectures from leaders in the field and short talks from young researchers and dedicated poster sessions. 

It provides a platform for discussion and debate about the current state of research, new findings and discoveries, challenges of the discipline and perspectives for biology, medical research and the society at large. 

Symposium 2023

23–25 August, ETH Zurich

Speakers

Bruce Blumberg, University of California Irvine, USA

Charlotte Cecil, Erasmus Medical Center, The Netherlands

Ina Dobrinski, University of Calgary, Canada

Andrew Feinberg, Johns Hopkins University, USA

Katharina Gapp, ETH Zurich, Switzerland

Carlos Guerrero Bosagna, Uppsula University, Sweden

Eric Greer, Washington University, St. Louis, USA

Jamie Hackett, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Italy

Simone Immler, University of East Anglia, UK (unfortunately cancelled)

Sarah Kimmins, McGill University, Canada

Martin Lind, Uppsala University, Sweden (unfortunately cancelled)

Susan Ozanne, University of Cambridge, UK

Bing Ren, University of California San Diego, USA

Aurora Ruiz-Herrera, Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain

Michael Skinner, Washington State University, USA

Jacquetta Trasler, McGill University, Canada

Ramji Bhandari, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, USA

Chamseddine Kifagi, Active Motif, Europe

Ali Jawaid, Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology, Poland

Yuta Takahashi, Altos Labs Institute of Science, USA

Raffaele Teperino, Helmholtz Diabetes Center, Munich, Germany

Workshop
“Questions and Challenges of the Field of Epigenetic Inheritance”
Co-organized with the Sir John Templeton Foundation

Sponsors

University Zurich

ETH Zurich

John Templeton Foundation

Socorex Swiss

Active Motif

SNSF Foundation

Symposium 2021

25–27 August, Online

Speakers

Jordana Bell, King’s College London, UK

Gavin Kelsey, The Babraham Institute, UK

Noora Kotaja, University of Turku, Finland

Brett Nixon, University of Newcastle, Australia

Anita Öst, Linköping University, Sweden

Wolf Reik, The Babraham Institute, UK

Kai Kleber, Dovetails Genomics, UK

Bermans Iskandar, University of Wisconsin, USA

Anar Alshanbayeva, University of Zurich and ETH Zurich, Switzerland

Emilie Rissman, North Carolina State University, USA

Michael Skinner, Washington State University, USA

Cecilie Svanes , University of Bergen, Norway

Fuchou Tang, Beijing Advanced Innovation Center for Genomics, Peking University, China

Adam Watkins, University of Nottingham, UK

Workshop
“Meet the Experts: Questions and Answers”
Co-organized with the Sir John Templeton Foundation

Sponsors

University Zurich

ETH Zurich

John Templeton Foundation

Socorex Swiss

Vitaris - A difference in Life Science

Dovetail Genomics - An EdenRoc Sciences Company

SNSF Foundation

Symposium 2019

26–28 August, ETH Zurich

Speakers

Patrick Allard, University of California, Los Angeles, USA

Tracie Baker, Wayne State University, Detroit, USA

Ramji Bhandari, University of North Carolina, Greensboro, USA

Romain Barrès, University of Copenhagen, Denmark

Qi Chen, University of California, Riverside, USA

Victor Corces, Emory University, Atlanta, USA

Lucia Daxinger, Leiden University Medical Center, Netherlands

Jill Escher, Escher Fund for Autism, USA

Larry Feig, Tufts University, Boston, USA

Anne Ferguson-Smith, University of Cambridge, UK

Valérie Grandjean, University of Nice Sophia Antipolis, France

Ali Jawaid, University and ETH Zurich, Switzerland

Alexander Meissner, Max-Plank Institute for Molecular Genetics, Germany

Gerlinde AS Metz, University of Lethbridge, Canada

Marcus Pembrey, UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health, UK

Michael Penkler; Munich Center for Technology in Society, DE

Antoine Peters, Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research, Switzerland

Andrew Pospisilik, Van Andel Institute, Grand Rapids, USA

Mark Robinson, University of Zurich, Switzerland

Rose Schrott, Duke University, Durham, USA

Julia Schröder, Imperial College London, UK (unfortunately cancelled)

Upasna Sharma, University of California, Santa Cruz, USA

Michael Skinner, Washington State University, Pullman, USA

Corrado Spadafora, Italian National Research Council, Italy

Azim Surani, University of Cambridge, UK

Workshop
“Questions and Challenges of the Field of Epigenetic Inheritance”
Co-organized with the Sir John Templeton Foundation

Sponsors

University Zurich

ETH Zurich

John Templeton Foundation

Swiss National Science Foundation

Zentrum für Labormedizin

illumina

ETH Zurich - Institute for Neuroscience

Socorex Swiss

Merck

milian - Dutscher Group

Agilent - Trusted Answers

Janvier Labs

Carl Roth

Active Motif

diagenode - Innovating Epigenetics Solutions

Macherey-Nagel

Vitaris - A Difference in Life Science

Latsis Symposium 2017

28–30 August, ETH Zurich

Speakers

Marine Baptissart, North Carolina State University, USA

Marisa Bartolomei, University of Pennsylvania, USA

Stephan Beck, University College London, UK

Christoph Bock, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna, Austria

Liran Carmel, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel

Jill Escher, Escher Fund for Autism of San Jose, USA

Katharina Gapp, Sanger Institute, Cambridge, UK

Johannes Graeff, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale, Lausanne, Switzerland

Carlos Guerrero-Bosagna, Linköping University, Sweden

Leah Houri-Ze’evi, Tel Aviv University, Israel

Eva Jablonka, Tel Aviv University, Israel

Josep Jiménez-Chillarón, Hospital Sant Joan de Deu, Barcelona, Spain

Maurizio Meloni, University of Sheffield, UK

Eric Miska, University of Cambridge, UK

Ruth Müller, Technical University Munich, Germany

Marcus Pembrey, University College London, UK

Vardhman Rakyan, Blizard Institute, London, UK

Minoo Rassoulzadegan, University of Nice, France

Abhay Sharma, CSIR-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, India

Michael Skinner, Washington State University, USA

Adelheid Soubry, Catholic University Leuven, Belgium

Peter Spork, Economic author, Hamburg, Germany

Moshe Szyf, McGill University, Montreal, Canada

Jorg Tost, Commissariat à l’Energie Atomique, Evry, France

Gretchen van Steenwyk, University and ETH Zurich, Switzerland

Rachel Yehuda, Mount Sinai Hospital, New York, USA

1st edition

Transgenerational Epigenetic Inheritance:

Impact for Biology and Society 

The Latsis Symposium 2017 is motivated by the wish and strong need to discuss and debate about the novel field of transgenerational epigenetic inheritance, an emerging discipline that is currently revolutionizing biology and is bringing novel perspectives for medical research and the society. The field addresses a key question in biology: What mediates heredity.

While it was thought to have been resolved by genetics, this question has re-emerged in the post-genomic era because of the recognition that there is more to an organism than its gene sequences. The question is considered one of the most burning and urgent to answer to date.

The main aim of the Latsis 2017 symposium is to discuss the breadth of biological phenomena involving epigenetics and their importance for transgenerational inheritance. The conference focuses on the issue of cross- and transgenerational inheritance of traits acquired by environmental exposure and personal experiences, a major mode of transmission that works outside classical Mendelian inheritance. Epigenetics is one of the most active and vibrant disciplines in biomedical research. It is of key importance because it not only provides new fundamental knowledge about basic mechanisms of biology but it also addresses critical medical issues. The identification of epigenetic marks and processes such as DNA methylation, histone posttranslational modifications and non-coding RNAs are moving the understanding of biological functions forward. Large-scale mapping projects have started to provide increasingly rich descriptions of the epigenome but have still incompletely answered questions about the role of these biochemical marks. Meanwhile there is growing interest in the therapeutic potential of epigenetic drugs that can modulate the epigenetic landscape and possibly have therapeutic actions that other drugs do not have. Genes encoding proteins that read, write or erase epigenetic marks are often mutated in neurological, psychiatric and metabolic diseases and in cancer, and are therefore key targets for potential innovative treatments.

Sponsors

The symposium is supported by the Latsis Foundation

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