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This was the initial meeting of the Deep Gene RCN group, and was timed
to coincide with the AAAS
annual meeting in San Francisco, at which a symposium
was held February 16th on "Deep Green: phylogeny, evolution, and
genomics of the green plants" along with a press
conference announcing the new Deep Gene and Deep Time RCNs.
The February 17th workshop, held in the Wine Country north of San Francisco,
began with very informal 5-minute research introductions by each of the
36 participants, to get the flavor of
the kinds of research we are all doing currently. This was followed by
intensive discussions of where research in phylogenomics might go in the
future if the currently separate communities of plants phylogeneticists
and plant genomicists integrated their efforts. Finally, we held a business
meeting, to decide how to spend the grant money this year, elect six people
to the initial RCN steering committee, decide how to attract collaborators
and enhance training of students, etc.
All attending agreed that this was probably the most diverse group of
botanists, in terms of expertise, that has ever gotten together in one
room for joint scientific discussions. It was a most promising start towards
the ambitious goals of the grant.. For details of the workshop proceedings,
see minutes.
Candid photos of the Sonoma meeting, kindly contributed by Rick McCourt:
a. Claude dePamphilis and the group, on the grounds of Westerbeke.
b. Shauna Somerville, Mel Oliver, and Chris Somerville in deep conversation.
c. Paul Wolf and Mike Sanderson smiling for the camera.
d. Russ Chapman taking minutes while Toby Kellogg and the group deliberates.
e. Neelima Sinha, Toby Kellogg, and Bob Kuzoff discuss floral development
and evolution.
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