2009 ANNUAL SCIENTIFIC CONFERENCE
Conference sponsors
 
 
Conference summary
The second UKNSCN Annual Scientific Conference took place on 6-8 April 2009 at the University of Oxford’s Examination Schools and was again a resounding success. Approximately 440 delegates were in attendance, including 120 poster presenters and 33 companies participating in the trade exhibition. Whilst the meeting was intentionally dominated by the UK community as a ‘national celebration’ of stem cell science here in the UK, there were several delegates in attendance from overseas, including Algeria, Australia, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Iran, Italy, Saudi Arabia, Spain, South Africa, Switzerland and the USA.
If you were one of the unlucky ones who missed the conference, there were several major highlights, not least of which was the second Dame Anne McLaren Memorial Lecture delivered by Janet Rossant of the Sick Children’s Hospital in Toronto, Canada. Dr Rossant spoke on the first day on Stem cells and lineage development in the early embryo and we were delighted that several members of the McLaren family were in attendance for the lecture. Other keynote speakers from overseas included Bob Nerem (Georgia Tech, Atlanta, USA) speaking on Stem cell technology: from basic biology to cellular therapies, and Joseph Vacanti (Harvard Stem Cell Institute) speaking on the Confluence of stem cell technologies and tissue engineering.
A key highlight of the conference was the conference dinner on the evening of the second day, held in an elegant marquee at the stunning St Hilda’s College in Oxford. Delegates were both entertained and educated by the engaging stories and research anecdotes from our eminent after-dinner speaker Sir Richard Gardner. The full programme from the conference is still available for viewing via the link below and, for the first time, included a series of six very popular parallel workshops on immunology, embryonic stem cells, mesenchymal stem cells, translation and commercialisation, haematopoietic stem cells and cardiac regeneration.
The total cost of the second conference amounted to approximately £195k. After income from delegate fees and sponsorship is taken into account, the real cost to UKNSCN was approximately £75k. For the second year running therefore, UKNSCN has heavily subsidised the meeting and, on this occasion, the costs amounted to 50% of UKNSCN’s current operating budget of £150k per annum.
Conference photo galleries
Acknowledgements
UKNSCN acknowledges the valuable contribution of its contracted events management company (Dynamic Events Limited) to the success of the 2009 conference. It also acknowledges the hard work of the conference programme committee which was chaired by Professor Jon Frampton (Birmingham) and included Roger Pedersen (Cambridge), Dame Julia Polak (Imperial), Paul Fairchild (Oxford), Anthony Hollander (Bristol) and Andrew Webster (York).
Acknowledgements are also due to the five sponsors of the 2009 conference: Applied Cytometry Ltd, Pfizer Regenerative Medicine, Stemcell Technologies Inc., Stemgent Inc. and Thermofisher Scientific. |
