Food security is a key challenge for mankind. Global agricultural production needs to be doubled to feed an ever-growing world population that may reach nine billion by 2050. We will address these global issues in a two-part session. A panel involving scientists, stakeholders and civil society will discuss with the audience how to adapt the current agro-food system to the food security challenge, as well as ethical, social and other concerns such as safety, productivity versus environmental sustainability, preservation of the biodiversity, and third world development issues.

The first part – Matching food demand and food supply – presents the many factors that will drastically affect the production and distribution of food worldwide (climate change, availability of land, demographic changes, etc.), as well as public policies (EU CAP, production of bio-energy) and social drivers (life style, consumption trends) that determine the market economy of the agro-food system.

The second part – Can science and technology help find sustainable solutions to feed nine billion people? – discusses scientific and bio-technological developments aiming at improving the quality, productivity and adaptability of plants to environmental conditions, notably using agro-engineering and land management strategies, as well as genetic engineering to improve agricultural production in a sustainable manner.

“When scientists describe the relations between axons, dendrites, perception, memory, concepts and the world outside a brain, I feel I am reading a description of what I always sensed was happening, but could not describe” (A.S. Byatt).

What can science learn from art and what can science say about the triggering of the creative process? A novelist and a leading neuroscientist (whose team discovered mirror neurons), world-class personalities in their fields, will talk about their work and seek to explore common grounds. What happens in the brain of a novelist when she is sketching the outline of a new work, chiseling characters, connecting places and memories, playing with the rhythm of the language? Are mirror neurons (which may be impor- tant for understanding the actions of other people, and for learning new skills by imitation) somewhat involved in the process? Is empathy towards fellow human beings the key factor? Conversely, is it possible that a deeper exploration of the creative process could help neuroscientists in their interpretation of the brain’s workings? Maybe even put forth new hypotheses or devise new experiments? The ultimate goal is to explore the possibility of true interdisciplinarity and to shed light on the shadow of metaphors in different contexts.

Found throughout nature, aquaporin water channels confer high water permeability to cell membranes. Discovered in human erythrocytes, AQP1 has been characterized biophysically, and the atomic structure of AQP1 is known. Twelve homologous proteins exist in humans. Some transport only water (aquaporins); others transport water plus glycerol (aquaglyceroporins). These proteins are required for generation of physiological fluids (urine, cerebrospinal fluid, aqueous humor, sweat, saliva, and tears). Involvement of aquaporins in multiple clinical states is becoming recognized—renal concentration, fluid retention, cataract, skin hydration, brain edema, thermal stress, glucose homeostasis, malaria, and even arsenic poisoning. Aquaporins are particularly important in plant biology. This information now provides the challenge of developing new technologies to manipulate aquaporins for clinical or agricultural benefits.

We all know that human life is full of compromises. Perhaps less appreciated, however, is the fact that all life, including our species, is the product of many compromises through the process of evolution. On one hand, the environment tests individuals continuously, and through natural selection, organisms become better adapted to prevailing conditions. On the other hand, genes and development influence how quickly, how well, and what way species can adapt. With climate change, the issue of how well evolution can track changing conditions is becoming an ever more timely topic. In other words, is there a risk that the changing climate outstrips the ability of species to adapt?

The objective of the session is to address this question by first illustrating how development is modified during evolution. Then, using examples ranging from butterflies to mammals, the session will demonstrate how adaptability of species may be compromised due to factors such as genetic interactions and rapid environmental fluctuations. In many species there is a continuous crosstalk between ecology and development, and a special emphasis is to point out how climate change can affect species at multiple steps of their life cycle. The proposed sessions will consist of an interdisciplinary panel highlighting the recent advances in studies integrating developmental genetics and ecology, and each presentation is planned as a starting point for discussions with the audience.

People interact. They travel. They move from households to schools, to workplaces, to distant places on trips. And diseases might travel with them. The current swine flu epidemic is just the last example of the crucial role that human mobility and interactions have on the spread of infectious diseases. People interact in workplaces, and their homes, and meet in crowded places. Rapid transportation infrastructures allow us to cover long distances on short time scales, and at the same time to carry a disease from an outbreak zone to a not yet infected region of the globe, reaching a propagation of pandemic proportion.

How much do we know about human interactions and mobility patterns? Recent years have witnessed a tremendous effort in the gathering, exploration and characterization of a huge flow of quantitative social, demographic and behavioral data. Quantitative studies of these datasets are key elements to the understanding of the spatial dynamics of human infectious diseases. They constitute the main ingredients of sophisticated large-scale models that can account, quantify and potentially predict the dynamics of emergent infectious diseases. This session will bring together the major experts in the field of human contact patterns and mobility of individuals at different scales.

The research goals of particle physics are to study the structure of the Universe at its most fundamental level by exploring the basic physics laws that govern the fundamental building blocks of matter and to explore the structure of space-time.

The important next step for the advancement of fundamental science is the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, the European Particle Physics Laboratory in Geneva (Switzerland). Proton-proton collisions at an unprecedented energy will in the coming years illuminate a new landscape of physics, possibly answering some of the most fundamental questions in modern physics, such as the origin of mass, the unification of fundamental forces and new forms of matter.

In this lecture we shall address the following questions: why do we perform fundamental research in particle physics and how it relates to cosmology, i.e. addressing the above mentioned physics goals of LHC in a broader context; what are the instruments and their technological challenges to perform this research; and the mission of CERN and the impact of fundamental research on society.

In all the discussions about climate change the “lifestyle” question is never far from the surface: will we be obliged to change our behaviour in fundamental ways? And is it essential that we do so? It hardly needs noting that limiting growth in material standards goes against the grain of our modern consumer society.

So what should we do? Do we look into existing ways of living “within our means” environmentally speaking, with a concomitant shift away from the values of the consumer society, or do we invest in new technologies in the hope that they will allow us to maintain our current standard of living – and allow others to attain this as well? In this session we will look at this issue as we discuss different approaches to sustainability, from practical action at a local level, to the creation of a truly sustainable global financial market. Throughout, we will focus on the way that we make choices and adapt to change. The format of this session will be a panel discussion with specialists on sustainable technologies, architecture, design, psychology, and economy. After we have heard from our speakers we will encourage participation from the audience during an open debate.

In the last decades a wealth of new knowledge has been produced concerning the biological (sex) and socio-cultural (gender) factors that influence individual health and healthcare of women and men. This innovative science field is known by the catchword “gender medicine”. Despite the existence of handbooks in English and German, specialized centres in Europe and an international society, the scope and impact of this field are not widely known. It promises to innovate drug development and therapies by taking account of sex differences, to unravel “stereotypical” gender roles that impede proper health preventive behaviour, and to redress the neglect of the other sex if a disease becomes labeled as a “female” (osteoporosis) or “male” (coronary heart) disease. EU research has stimulated this kind of biomedical and health research; unfortunately these issues are not yet taught at a regular base in (bio)medical curricula nor spread among society at large.

This session will sensitize the wider community of (young) scientists, policy makers and the general public to the relevance of gender medicine for health care by an interactive discussion and exchange of best practices. Expert contributions and telling examples from various research fields (basic/preclinical research, physical health, mental health, public health) will be the core elements of this session in order to disseminate the new insights and to stimulate its application. The Project GenderBasic will be the starting point.