What are the next ITC topics?

The International Titisee Conferences are organized two years in advance. Here you will find topics, chairs, dates, and if already available, lists of confirmed speakers for the upcoming International Titisee Conferences. 

Chaired by Benjamin L. Ebert (Boston, MA, USA) and Peter Campbell (Hinxton, Cambridgeshire, UK)

Somatic mutations accumulate in all cells as we age – these mutations begin to accumulate from the moment of conception and continue steadily throughout life in all tissues, even post-mitotic cells. There is cell-to-cell, organ-to-organ, person-to-person, and country-to-country variation in mutation rates and signatures, with much of this variability remaining unexplained. By the time we reach 70 years of age, our bodies will carry in the order of 100 quadrillion somatic mutations, generating huge clonal diversity among cells, providing the substrate for selective processes to enhance or suppress the growth of individual somatic clones.

The meeting will cover the characterization of somatic mutations in healthy and diseased tissues, across many organ systems, spanning the age range from foetal development to the elderly. We will consider the roles that somatic mutations play in the earliest stages of cancer evolution, the functional decline associated with advancing age, and the pathogenesis of diseases other than cancer. We will explore how somatic mutations and selective landscapes could be manipulated, initially in experimental models but ultimately in vivo in humans, to modify the pace of ageing and cancer development.

Invited Speakers:

  • David B. Beck (New York, NY, USA)
  • Cabezas-Wallscheid, Nina (Feiburg, Germany)
  • Cvejic, Ana (Copenhagen, DK)
  • Dick, John (Toronto, ON, Canada)
  • Ernst, Aurélie (Heidelberg, Germany)
  • Fernandez-Antoran, David (Cambridge, UK)
  • Garaycoechea, Juan I. (Utrecht, The Netherlands)
  • Gleeson, Joe (La Jolla, CA, USA)
  • Goodell, Margaret A. (Houston, TX, USA)
  • Graham, Trevor (London, UK)
  • Grayson, Peter (Bethesda, MD, USA)
  • Jaiswal, Siddhartha (Stanford, CA, USA)
  • Janes, Sam (London, UK)
  • Jones, Phil H. (Cambridge, UK)
  • Ju, Young Seok (Daejon, Korea)
  • Knappskog, Stian (Bergen, Norway)
  • Kregar, Lori D. (Cambridge, UK)
  • Landau, Dan (New York, NY, USA)
  • López-Bigas, Núria (Barcelona, Spain)
  • Manz, Markus (Zurich, Switzerland)
  • Martincorena, Inigo (Hinxton, Cambridgehire, UK)
  • Maslov, Alex (Bronx, NY, USA)
  • Naxerova, Kamila (Boston, MA, USA)
  • Niemeyer, Charlotte (Freiburg, Germany)
  • Ogawa, Seishi (Kyoto, Japan)
  • Ólafsson, Sigurgeir (Reykjavik, Island)
  • Patel, Ketan J. (Oxford, UK)
  • Poetsch, Anna (Dresden, Germany)
  • Rahbari, Raheleh (Hinxton, Cambridgehire, UK)
  • Sanders, Mathijs A. (Rotterdam, The Netherlands)
  • Sankaran, Vijay (Boston, MA, USA)
  • Stratton, Mike (Hinxton, Cambridgehire, UK)
  • Walsh, Christopher (Boston, MA, USA)
  • Weeks, Lachelle Dawn (Boston, MA, USA)
  • Zucman-Rossi, Jessica (Paris, France)

Chaired by Maya Schuldiner, Rehovot, Israel and Blanche Schwappach-Pignatoro, Hamburg, Germany

One of the hallmarks of eukaryotic cells are their membrane-bound organelles that create biochemically distinct environments within the cellular milieu. Organelles enable a diversification of functions that is extremely beneficial to the cell. However, it also creates the cell’s most severe problem – how to ensure successful communication between membrane-bound entities to coordinate cellular function.

The 2024 Titisee spring-meeting will showcase the varied ways in which organelles communicate and coordinate – through contact sites, signalling cascades, and vesicular trafficking pathways. We will also focus on how these means of communication are hijacked during infection and on the cellular consequences of their breakdown during ageing and disease progression. Our overarching goal is to bring together experts from multiple disciplines that usually do not meet to uncover fundamental principles of intracellular organization and communication.

Invited speakers

  • Antonny, Bruno (Valbonne, France)
  • Bayer, Emmanuelle (Bordeaux, France)
  • Bohnert, Maria (Münster, Germany)
  • Broichhagen, Johannes (Berlin, Germany)
  • Carvalho, Pedro (Oxford, United Kingdom)
  • Chacinska, Agnieszka (Warsaw, Poland)
  • Costello, Joseph (Exeter, United Kingdom)
  • Cruz-Zaragoza, Luis Daniel (Göttingen, Germany)
  • Firat Karalar, Elif Nur (Istanbul, Turkey)
  • Forester, Alison (Namur, Belgium)
  • Gonzalez Montoro, Ayelen (Osnabrück, Germany)
  • Griffiths, Gillian M. (Cambridge, UK)
  • Hermann, Johannes (Kaiserslautern Germany)
  • Höglinger, Doris (Oxford, United Kingdom)
  • Jabs, Sabrina (Kiel, Germany)
  • Kim, Peter K. (Toronto, ON, Canada)
  • Klemm, Robin W. (Oxford, United Kingdom)
  • Kukulski, Wanda (Bern, Switzerland)
  • Laufmann, Orly (Rehovot, Israel)
  • McDowell, Melanie (Frankfurt/Oder, Germany)
  • Misgeld, Thomas (Munich, Germany)
  • Nuebel, Esther ( Salt Lake City, UT, USA)
  • Padinjat, Raghu (Bangalore, India)
  • Rapaport, Doron (Tübingen, Germany)
  • Reggiori, Fulvio Mario (Aarhus, Denmark)
  • Rehling, Peter (Göttingen, Germany)
  • Sheiner, Liach (Glasgow, United Kingdom)
  • Shpilka, Tomer (Worchester, MA, USA)
  • Sigismund, Sara Lucia Giustina (Milano, Italy)
  • Spang, Anne (Basel, Switzerland)
  • Stenmark, Harald (Oslo, Norway)
  • Voeltz, Gia (Boulder, CO, USA)
  • Walter, Peter (San Francisco, CA, USA)
  • Winklhofer, Konstanze F. (Bochum, Germany)

Chaired by Anthony Hyman, Dresden, Germany and Donald Hilvert, Zurich, Switzerland

Understanding the regulation and robustness of metabolic systems is a major challenge in biology. This meeting aims to bring together experts in biomolecular condensates and enzymatic systems to discuss how condensates might influence metabolic regulation and robustness.

While the importance of compartmentalization in metabolism is well-established, it has traditionally been associated with membrane-bound compartments. However, recent discoveries have revealed that many compartments are organized as membraneless condensates. This has redirected attention towards the influence of local enzyme and metabolite concentrations on biochemical reactions. The physical principles of phase separation, reaction diffusion systems, energy consumption, and metabolite fluxes within compartments are being investigated to elucidate their impact on biochemistry.

In the 1920s, Oparin and Haldane proposed that life originated in coacervates, physically separated chemical reactions in the primordial soup. In the 1970s, biochemists recognized the need for higher-order structures to regulate multi-enzyme pathways and proposed the concept of "metabolons." The recent discovery of enzymatic compartments organized by phase separation has renewed interest in the concept of enzyme co-localization. These reversible, flexible, and adaptable condensates may represent the physical manifestation of metabolons proposed earlier, suggesting the preservation of early principles in the organization of cellular biochemistry in present-day organisms.

Invited speakers

  • Alberti, Simon (Dresden, Germany)
  • Arosio, Paolo (Zurich, Switzerland)
  • Benkovic, Stephen J. (University Park, PA, USA)
  • Brangwynne, Clifford P. (Princeton, NJ, USA)
  • Colón-Ramos, Daniel (New Haven, CT, USA)
  • Dufresne, Eric R. (Ithaca, NY, USA)
  • Erb, Tobias J. (Marburg, Germany)
  • Flitsch, Sabine L. (Manchester, United Kingdom)
  • Hayer-Hartl, Manajit (Martinsried, Germany)
  • Johnson, Kenneth A. (Austin, TX, USA)
  • Johnsson, Kai (Heidelberg, Germany)
  • Jülicher, Frank M. (Dresden, Germany)
  • Kerfeld, Cheryl (East Lansing, MI, USA)
  • Kim, John K. (Baltimore, MD, USA)
  • Knowles, Tuomas (Cambridge, United Kingdom)
  • Kollman, Justin (Seattle, WA, USA)
  • Kyoung, Minjoung (Baltimore, MD, USA)
  • Lemke, Edward A. (Mainz, Germany)
  • Mahamid, Julia (Heidelberg, Germany)
  • Mann, Stephen (Bristol, United Kingdom)
  • Mitchison, Timothy J. (Boston, MA, USA)
  • Moran, Joseph (Strasbourg, France)
  • Phillips, Rob. B. (Pasadena, CA, USA)
  • Picotti, Paola (Zurich, Switzerland)
  • Racki, Lisa (La Jolla, CA, USA)
  • Ralser, Markus (Berlin, Germany)
  • Rodenfels, Jonathan (Dresden, Germany)
  • Rosen, Michael K. (Dallas, TX, USA)
  • Sartori, Pablo (Oeiras, Portugal)
  • Schmidt-Dannert, Claudia (St. Paul, MN, USA)
  • Spruijt, Evan (Nijmegen, The Netherlands)
  • Tang, Dora (Dresden, Germany)
  • Webb, Bradley A. (Morgantown, WV, USA)
  • Wingreen, Ned S. (Princeton, NJ, USA)
  • Yeates, Todd O. (Los Angeles, CA, USA)
  • Zhang, Jin (La Jolla, CA, USA)
  • Zwicker, David (Göttingen, Germany)