PROJECT SUMMARY This proposal seeks support for the conference on Network Biology, to take place March 19-23, 2019, at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL). This meeting, held biennially on the CSHL campus in New York, brings together senior and junior scientists from both experimental and computational laboratories with common interests in network biology. The 2019 meeting will emphasize new discoveries and provide an open forum for the presentation of the latest research and results on molecular networks and their relevance to normal and abnormal cellular physiology. It will be essential for advancing knowledge in all aspects of the network modeling process, from data generation in experimental cell biology to data analysis and computer simulation and from the development and validation of network models describing these data to biological inferences made from the models. The conference will include platform sessions on interaction networks, signaling and network dynamics, regulatory networks, computational tools and big data, multi-scale networks, networks and disease, networks in differentiation, microbiome networks, network evolution, and synthetic networks and network engineering, though the exact program for the meeting will be assembled after the abstract submission deadline in January 2019. This conference will include significant components designed to facilitate the active participation of younger scientists such as selection of platform speakers on the basis of the scientific merit of their submitted abstracts as well as poster presentations and poster prizes. The intimate environment at CSHL also fosters active participation by all. Finally, women, who have historically comprised approximately 36% of the meeting attendees, will also be well represented. A panel discussion will address the challenges of Women in Network Science. At the time of submission, 1 of the 4 organizers for the 2019 meeting and 12 of the currently 23 invited attendees (speakers, session chairs and discussion panelists) (48% of participating senior scientists) are women.

PROJECT NARRATIVE Biological systems are functionally and structurally formed by complex networks of interacting molecular components, many of which are encoded in the genome. Elucidating the structure and function of these networks and understanding how their dysregulation causes disease are critical steps toward improving human health. This application seeks support for the 2019 conference on Network Biology to be held March 19-23 at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, to bring together experimental and computational biologists and discuss emerging trends and latest results in the field.