Activities

• Seminars
• Conferences, Schools
• News
• Center for Theoretical Physics's Day
• Annual reports

News

International Workshop on Computational Biophysics (Ho Chi Minh city, 1-5 Feb 2010)

Workshop's website:
http://khcn.vnuhcm.edu.vn/source/hoinghi/

FIRST ANNOUNCEMENT

International Workshop on Computational Biophysics (IWCBP-1)
February 01-05, 2010

Chairman: Paolo Carloni, International School for Advanced Studies, Italy (SISSA)

Organizers:

- Hoang Zung, Vietnam National University Ho Chi Minh City (VNU-HCM)

- Tran Linh Thuoc, University of Science, VNU-HCM

- Le Quan Nghiem, University of Medicine and Pharmacy at Ho Chi Minh City (UMPHCM)

- Mai Suan Li, Saigon Institute of Computational Science and Technology (SICST) and Institute of Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences (IF PAN)

- Nguyen Hong Quang, Institute of Physics (IOP), Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology (VAST)

Invited Speakers:

- Paolo Carloni (SISSA): Computational spectroscopy of biomolecules

- Mai Suan Li (SICST and IF PAN): Gromacs software

- Jung-Hsin Lin, National Taiwan University, Taiwan (NTU): Amber software

- Michele Parrinello (ETH, Zurich): Advances in biomolecular simulation

- Ursula Rothlisberger (EPFL, Lausanne): QM/MM methods

- Mike Klein, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA (UPP): Coarse grained modeling of large macromolecular aggregates

- Stefano Piana (Shaw Company, NY)(*): Large-scale simulations

- Giovanni Bussi (University of Modena, Italy): New algorithms for MD of biological systems

- David Beveridge (New Haven, USA)(*): Biomolecular simulation of nucleic acids

(*) To be confirmed

Location: Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Description

This meeting consists of the three-day school and two-day workshop.

The school will be focused on state-of-the-arte molecular simulation methods for studying biomolecules. Emphasis will be given to the investigation of human diseases, like the Alzheimer’s, AIDS, bird- and swine-origin influenza diseases. The choice of specific topics is dictated by needs for promotion of research in these areas in several laboratories in Vietnam.

The workshop will cover aspects of protein folding and misfolding, computer-aided drug design, coarse-grain modeling, quantum simulation, free energy calculations, computational spectroscopy and other topics.

Most lecturers will give 2 hours lectures at the school and 40 min talk at the workshop. Some of the lecturers (G. Bussi, S. Piana, I. Tavernelli) will be asked to do four hours of lectures/hands-on exercises (they also will give 40 min lectures at the workshop).

Scientific Objectives

Molecular computational biophysics is at its infancy in Vietnam. This conference will help to develop a basic knowledge in this emerging field to VN scientists and students of various backgrounds. It will allow establishing connections between the experimental work in molecular medicine and computational physics at universities and research institutes in Vietnam.

Topics

The topics will include (but they will not be limited to):

1. Diseases like the Alzheimer’s and Parkinson diseases, which affect a large portion of senior population, are associated with amyloid protein aggregates. Understanding of mechanisms of fibril formation is extremely important for the development of drugs to treat these diseases. Molecular simulation can serve as a useful tool to study easily observable effects such as effects of mutations and more importantly to uncover general principles behind molecular aggregation processes.

2. Influenza viruses cause annual epidemics and occasional pandemics that have claimed the lives of millions. The emergence of new trains will continue to pose challenges to public health and the scientific communities. A prime example is the recent emergence of swine-origin H1N1 viruses that have transmitted to and spread among humans, resulting in outbreaks internationally. Currently, there is increasing evidence that H5N1 virus is highly resistant to commercial drugs Tamiflu and Relenza. The swine A/H1N1 have been found to resist to Tamiflu in some cases. Therefore, the development of new vaccines and antiviral drugs should be of high priority. In addition to other techniques such as protein-ligand docking, the molecular dynamics (MD) simulations can be used for searching new inhibitors.

Students will have the opportunity to learn a variety of simulation methods, including Car-Parrinello MD (Prof. Carloni), effective potentials- based MD (Prof. J-H. Lin and Prof. M. S. Li), coarse-grained modeling (Mike Klein).

Invited speakers will also give talks on progress of computational study of various diseases such as conformational diseases, avian and swine flu. The participants are encouraged to present their results on relevant problems.

Important dates

The deadline for school and workshop registration: December 31, 2009
The deadline for abstract submission: December 31, 2009
The notification of abstract acceptance: December 31, 2009
The deadline of manuscript submission: January 10, 2010

For registration and further information please visit: http://khcn.vnuhcm.edu.vn/source/hoinghi/

Contact persons:

Mr. Nguyen Chi Linh: Email: nclink@hcmus.edu.vn, Mobile: +84 90 921 4842

Ms. Dao Thi Hong : Email: dthong@iop.vast.ac.vn, Mobile: +84 98 334 2198