Research Symposium - The Origins and Evolution of Bacterial Genomes

Dec 7th - 8th 2014

In association with the Canadian Mathematical Society and the Origins Institute of McMaster University

This symposium focuses on the evolution and comparative analysis of bacterial and archaeal genomes. How fast does gene gain and loss occur? How frequent is horizontal gene transfer? How tree-like is evolution at the genome level? What kinds of mathematical methods are necessary for analysis of genome data?

Sunday 7th December

At CMS Conference Venue - Sheraton Hotel, Hamilton

Genomes Plenary Lecture in Ballroom Centre/East

8.00 - 9.00 - Robert Beiko - Dalhousie University - When Phylogenetic Trees Can’t Agree: Building a coherent network of microbial gene sharing

Genomes Symposium in Wellington Room

9.00 - 10.00 - Yuri Wolf - National Center for Biotechnology Information - Turbulent genomes: quantification of gene acquisition, loss and displacement in prokaryotes.

10.00 - 10.30 Break

CMS Conference Plenary Lectures in Ballroom Centre/East

10.30 - 11.30 - Miroslav Lovric - McMaster University - What Everyone is Talking About: Math for the 21st Century

11.30 - 12.30 - Askold Khovanskii - Toronto - Algebraic geometry, Newton polyhedra and Newton--Okounkov bodies

12.30 - 2.00 - Lunch break

Genomes Symposium in Wellington Room

2.00 - 3.00 - Tal Dagan - University of Kiel - Phylogenomic networks reveal trends and barriers to lateral gene transfer during microbial evolution

3.00 - 3.30 - Break

3.30 - 4.00 - Daniel Brown - University of Waterloo - Fast algorithms for phylogenetic reconstruction of aligned sequences

4.00 - 4.30 - Weilong Hao - Wayne State University - Estimating evolutionary rates of discrete characters, and its application to genome evolution

4.30 - 5.00 - Radhey Gupta - McMaster University - Applications of Group specific Conserved Signature Proteins for the Identification of Microorganisms in Metagenomic Sequences

5.00 - 5.30 - Paul Higgs - McMaster University - Phylogenetic models of bacterial genome evolution incorporating gene insertion and deletion and horizontal gene transfer

Monday 8th December

At McMaster University - Origins Centre ABB245

8.30 - Meet and Mingle

9.00 - 11.00 Discussion - Building and Analyzing Prokaryotic Genome Databases

• Paul Higgs - McMaster - Controversial questions about genomes
• Eric Collins - University of Alaska - Gene clusters and what we can do with them
• Yuri Wolf / Kira Makarova - COGs and arCOGs
• Radhey Gupta - McMaster University - Database of signature genes
• Andrew MacArthur - McMaster University - Database of antibiotic resistance genes

11.00 - 11.30 Break

11.30 - 11.50 Steven Norris - University of Texas, Houston - Protein-based supertree phylogeny of spirochetes

11.50 - 12.10 Yogeshwar Kelkar - University of Rochester - Evolution of G+C contents of bacterial genomes

12.10 - 12.30 Utkarsh Dang - McMaster University - Modelling gene indel rates while accounting for missing data