Conference
Programme

Sunday 16 February

Name badge pick up

3.00pm


Welcome Reception

5.00 - 6.30pm

Monday 17 February

Registrations open

8.00am


Welcome and mihi whakatau

9.00am


Keynote

Malcolm White
The diversity and regulation of type III CRISPR systems

9.30am


MORNING TEA

10.20am


RNA-targeting CRISPR

Doreen Addo-Yobo
A CRISPR-associated Rossman-fold Ring Nuclease and Adenosine Deaminase Fusion Allosterically Converts ATP to ITP

10.50am


Naama Aviram
Cas10 nuclease activity relieves host growth arrest to facilitate spacer retention during type III-A CRISPR immunity

11.10am


Mohamed Fareh
The molecular basis of target recognition and cleavage by CRISPR-Cas13

11.30am


Mitch O'Connell
Pulling the Plug on Bacteriophage Infection: The Pore Behavior of Membrane Proteins that Reside Within RNA-Targeting CRISPR-Cas and other Antiphage Defense Systems

11.50am


LUNCH
LUNCH AND LEARN SESSION WITH EDILYTICS

12.00pm


anti-CRISPR

Nicole Marino
Translation-dependent downregulation of Cas12a mRNA by an anti-CRISPR protein

1.30pm


Alan Davidson
Structures and Mechanisms of Type I-E anti-CRISPRs Elucidated Using a New E. coli CRISPR-Cas System

1.50pm


Katharina Wandera
AcrVIB1 turns Cas13b into a crRNA trap

2.10pm


Ryan Catchpole
Invaders and evaders from the deep!

2.30pm


AFTERNOON TEA

2.50pm


Ming Li
Multilayered CRISPR Defense and Anti-CRISPR Counteraction

3.20pm


Yan Zhang
An unbiased de novo Acr discovery approach uncovered novel anti-CRISPR mechanisms by Neisseria filamentous phage

3.40pm


Lightning Talks

4.00pm


Poster Session

4.30pm


Day one concludes

6.30pm

Tuesday 18 February

Registrations open

8.00am


Adaptation

Joshua Modell
Temperate phages facilitate CRISPR-Cas immunizations through diverse mechanisms

9.00am


Leah Smith
Protospacer competition between type I and III CRISPR-Cas systems influences plasmid clearance

9.20am


Alexander Meeske
Crosstalk between three CRISPR-Cas types enables primed type VI-A adaptation in Listeria seeligeri

9.40am


Ugne Gaizauskaite
Prespacer selection by the Type II-A Cas9-Cas1-Cas2-Csn2 Holo-Complex in CRISPR-Cas adaptation

10.00am


MORNING TEA

10.20am


Class 2

Chase Beisel
Exploring and harnessing the functional diversity of CRISPR-Cas12a2 nucleases

10.50am


Grace Hibshman
Mechanism of type II-B CRISPR-Cas enhanced specificity

11.10am


Yanli Wang
An R-loop-dependent RNase: structural basis for the inhibition of Cas9 by AcrIIA5

11.30am


Florian Hoffmann
TBC

11.50am


LUNCH

12.00pm


Technology

Ailong Ke
Less is more: Converting IscB to a versatile RNA-guided RNA editing tool by switching off its DNA-binding activity

1.30pm


Jun-Jie (Gogo) Liu
RNA and Gene-editing

1.50pm


Cameron Myhrvold
CRISPR-based technologies for multiplexed nucleic acid detection

2.10pm


TBC

2.30pm


AFTERNOON TEA

2.50pm


TBC

3.20pm


Hilary Longhurst
In vivo CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing of KLKB1in patients with hereditary angioedema (C1 inhibitor deficiency)

3.40pm


Poster Session

4.00pm


Day two concludes

6.00pm

Conference Dinner
Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū

Evening


Wednesday 19 February

Registrations open

8.00am


Ecology/Evolution

Aude Bernheim
Evolution of immunity across domains of life

9.00am


Sean Meaden
Environmental distributions of CRISPR and defence systems across environments

9.20am


Kepler Mears
TnpB enables the intracellular gene drive of IS200/605 transposons in plasmids

9.40am


Shai Zilberzwige Tal
Reprogrammable RNA-targeting CRISPR systems evolved from RNA toxin-antitoxin

10.00am


MORNING TEA

10.20am


CASTs and ecosystems

Elizabeth Kellog
Efforts to understand and engineer CAST for improved activity/specificity

10.50am


Diego Gelsinger
Metagenomic editing using CASTs enables genetic access to diverse and unculturable bacteria in the gut microbiome

11.10am


Agnes Oromi-Bosch
Self-selecting systems for CAST-based microbiome editing

11.30am


Bruria Samuel
Plasmids Fight Back: Anti-Defense Systems Boost Conjugation Efficiency

11.50am


LUNCH

12.10pm


Beyond CRISPR

Blake Wiedenheft
CRISPRs, anti-CRISPR, and ATP-driven sensors that trigger translational arrest

1.30pm


Alex Hong
Gabija is activated by a phage DNA recombination system that antagonizes CRISPR

1.50pm


Monika Jasnauskaite
Structure and mechanisms of retron Ec67

2.10pm


Giovanni Leandri
Insights into Azaca: a novel widespread antiphage defence system

2.30pm


AFTERNOON TEA

2.50pm


Asma Hatoum-Aslan
Anti-phage defenses in staphylococci

3.20pm


Bruce Wang
Discovery of transcriptionally regulated anti-phage defence systems with single-cell massively-parallel multiplexed microbial sequencing (M3-seq)

3.40pm


Ning Jia
Mechanistic insights into reverse transcriptases in anti-phage defense

4.00pm


Feng Zhang
Exploration of Biological Diversity

4.20pm


Concluding remarks

4.40pm


Scientific program concludes

5.00pm


Thursday 20 February

Optional day trip to Akaroa - click here for further details

8.00am - 4.30pm