Welcome to China! Welcome to Guangzhou! Welcome to the TT2013 Meeting!

Dear Colleagues and Friends,

On behalf of the International Society for Transgenic Technologies (ISTT), I am very pleased to invite you to attend the 11th Transgenic Technology (TT) meeting. TT2013, will be held in Guangzhou/Canton, P.R. China, on February 25-27, 2013, at the BaiyunInternationalConvention Center. The TT2013 meeting is organized by Prof. Ming Zhao of the Southern Medical University, Guangzhou.

The TT2013 meeting will be taking place immediately after the Chinese New Year festival, celebrating the beginning of the Year of the Snake. Ancient Chinese wisdom says a snake in the house is a good omen because it means that your family will not starve. People born in the Year of the Snake are keen and cunning, quite intelligent and wise. They are great mediators and good at doing business. Therefore, all the popular Chinese signs portend a very successful and lucky TT2013 meeting.

The ISTT visits Asia for the first time, after previous ISTT-sponsored conferences that were organized in Europe (Barcelona-TT2005, Berlin-TT2010), North America (Toronto-TT2008, Florida-TT2011) and Oceania (Brisbane-TT2007). This will be our 11th meeting, providing us an opportunity to celebrate this unique forum, originally pioneered by Johannes Wilbertz (Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden) in 1999. Since the inception of the ISTT in 2006, the TT meetings have been the main event promoted and sponsored by our Society. We are glad to visit China, and are most grateful to Prof. Ming Zhao for having organized this TT2013 meeting, which we hope will serve to strengthen our relationships and collaborations with colleagues from China and other countries in Asia.

We welcome all attendees who are in the process of generating genetically-modified animals or who perform the experiments that follow to determine the corresponding phenotypes of such transgenic animals. The program should be of interest to scientists, group leaders, postdoctoral researchers, facility managers, technicians and PhD students working directly or indirectly with genetically-modified animals. We invite you to participate and contribute to this conference where we will discuss the latest technology developments, the newest applications and strategies in biology, biomedicine and biotechnology using transgenic animals. Companies and institutions with an interest in this field are kindly invited to participate and share their latest technologies.

At the TT2013 meeting we will have many talks focused on transgenic and knockout animals, rodents and non-rodents. The program includes updates about several regional and international initiatives on the use of transgenic animals in research and the innovative use of targeted nucleases and their applications in transgenic animals. We will continue our round-table discussion titled “Running a transgenic facility”, where topics of interest recently selected by ISTT members and participants will be discussed. We will also learn about the most relevant bioethics and animal welfare issues. A new topic of significant interest is the area of epigenetic alterations that can occur during embryo culture in vitro, and the subsequent impact on phenotype. In summary, we will have the opportunity to hear the latest results and vision from some of the most prestigious and knowledgeable scientists in our field. Last but not the least, immediately following the conference, a three day workshop made up of transgenic experiment design classes and hands-on laboratory exercises will be offered for those who wish to develop a strong background in transgenic technologies and applications.

Most notably, at the TT2013 meeting, we will award the 9th ISTT Prize for outstanding contributions to the field of transgenic technologies. In this occasion, we are proud to announce that the awarded scientist will be Prof. Alan Bradley, Director Emeritus of the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (WTSI), and leader of the Mouse Genomics Team at WTSI, a fundamental figure in our field. His pioneering mouse embryonic stem (ES) cell work in the 1980s, demonstrating germ-line transmission and the great potential of ES cells to generate mice carrying mutations in endogenous genes, established milestones in a field that saw the award of the 2007 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine to Mario Capecchi, Martin Evans, and Oliver Smithies. Past ISTT award winners include Ralph L. Brinster, Francis A. Stewart, Brigid Hogan, Charles Babinet, Andras Nagy, Qi Zhou, Kenneth McCreath and Teruhiko Wakayama.

The Baiyun International Convention Center-Oriental International Convention Hotel in Guangzhou is the largest comprehensive five-star hotel in Southern China, with an established record of hosting successful meetings and perfect supporting facilities. Located on the Baiyun Mountain, in the Baiyun New Town and overlooking the Baiyun Mountain Scenic Area and the Oriental Resort, this Convention Center is a fully equipped, self-contained meeting resort. More than 40 international air routes serve the new Baiyun International Airport, a 20 minute drive from the Baiyun International Convention Center.

Guangzhou is the Capital and the largest city of the Guangdong province in Southern China, with about 13 million inhabitants. Guangzhou is the main manufacturing hub of the Pearl River Delta, one of mainland China’s leading commercial and manufacturing regions. Guangzou is located just South of the Tropic of Cancer and has a humid subtropical climate. Average temperatures in Guangzhou in February are between 12ºC/53ºF to 19ºC/65ºF with about 78% humidity and an average of 30% chance of rain. In addition to attending this exciting TT2013 meeting, there will be plenty of opportunities for you to visit interesting places around and to experience the rich Chinese culture and history.

On behalf of the ISTT and of the TT2013 Organizing Committee I invite you to attend the TT2013 meeting. Registration will open in June, 2012.

See you all in Guangzhou!

 
Lluis Montoliu, PhD
President of the ISTT