Introduction

Victor May & Rodney L. Parsons & Illana Gozes

Published online: 13 June 2008# Humana Press 2008

Introduction

The 8th International Symposium on VIP, PACAP andRelated Peptides was held in Manchester, Vermont, USAon September 3–7, 2007. It was followed by a satellitemeeting entitled “Neural Stem Cells and Brain Repair:

Roles in Learning, Memory and Functional Recovery” onSeptember 8, 2007 chaired by Robert W. Hamill andEmanuel DiCicco-Bloom at the University of VermontCollege of Medicine Campus in Burlington, Vermont,USA. Over 100 registered participants from internationallaboratories attended the meetings during a seasonal earlyfall week in New England. It was further followed by theSummer Neuropeptide Conference in Burlington, Vermont,an annual event that studies neuropeptides in general,chaired by Illana Gozes, Y. Peng Loh, and Douglas E.Brenneman.

After brief opening remarks, the symposium commencedwith an opening lecture by Jan Fahrenkrug (BispebjergHospital, University of Copenhagen) on the “Roles ofPACAP and VIP in the mammalian circadian clock”.Subsequently, during the next several days, 34 oral paperswere delivered over nine sessions. Each session openedwith a symposium lecture delivered by an establishedinvestigator in the field, including William C. deGroat(University of Pittsburgh), David Vaudry (Unite INSERMU413, University of Rouen), Seiji Shioda (Showa Univer-sity), M. Michael Wolfe (Boston University), Ethan Lerner(Harvard University), Marc Laburthe (Centre de RechercheBiomedicale Bichat-Beaujon), Robert Jensen (NIH/NIDDK), Nancy Sherwood (University of Victoria), IllanaGozes (Tel Aviv University), and Lee Eiden (NIH/NIMH).The evenings were punctuated by two award lectures.Stephen Bloom, from the Imperial College of London,arrived at the meeting just in time to deliver the Viktor MuttAward Lecture entitled “GEP peptides powerfully influenceappetite—an ongoing story”, a stellar talk that balanced thecurrent state of obesity research with high wit and humor.In honor of Akira Arimura, the organizers of the sympo-sium initiated a new Akira Arimura Young InvestigatorAward and the first recipient was Billy K. C. Chow from

J Mol Neurosci (2008) 36:1–2DOI 10.1007/s12031-008-9106-2

V. May (*) : R. L. ParsonsUniversity of Vermont College of Medicine,Burlington, VT, USAe-mail: Victor.May@uvm.edu

I. GozesAdams Super Center for Brain Studies, Tel Aviv University,Tel Aviv, Israel

I. GozesAllon Therapeutics Inc.,Vancouver, Canada

the University of Hong Kong. Dr. Chow’s lecture, entitled“Secretin: a potential neurosecretory factor regulating bodywater homeostasis” was masterful in walking the audiencethrough the intricate experimental data linking secretin withwater balance functions. Two poster sessions also were heldduring the evenings for the presentation of another 50abstracts. Finally, the symposium was closed with a lectureby Sami Said (SUNY Stonybrook) entitled “VIP & relatedpeptides: the long road from discovery to drug develop-ment”; he also paid a special tribute to Miklos Bodanszky forhis unparalleled accomplishments in peptide biochemistry.

The satellite meeting on neural stem cells and brainrepair began with an overview lecture by Emanuel DiCicco-Bloom (Rutgers University). The three lectures, entitled“Stem cell biology and regenerative neuroscience” by JackKessler (Northwestern University School of Medicine),“Building or repairing a brain is complex—assemblyinstructions required” by Jeffrey Macklis (MassachusettsGeneral Hospital—Harvard Medical School), and “Findingtherapeutics for neurological diseases in academic set-tings” by Lee Rubin (Harvard University) were a tour deforce in the current state of neural stem cell research.

The symposium would not have been possible withoutimportant contributions from the National Institutes ofChild Health and Human Development (NICHD), theNational Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and KidneyDiseases (NIDDK), the National Center for ResearchResources (NCRR), the American Association of Anato-mists (AAA), and the Kaken Foundation. Their supportprovided the many student travel grants presented at themeeting. Our corporate sponsorships were also invaluable.To Steven Weiner of Bachem America, Jack Glaser of MBFBioscience, and Douglas Brenneman of Johnson & Johnson,a special thank you for their generosity. We also thank themany local Vermont companies and subsidiaries, FisherScientific, Med Associates, and Living Systems Instrumen-tation for their funding. The support of the Department ofAnatomy and Neurobiology, Department of Neurology, andFletcher Allen Health Care at the University of VermontCollege of Medicine were also critical and very muchappreciated.

The closing moments of the meetings did not allow us tothank the many individuals whose work made the meetingactivities so seamless. From the University, we thankKristin Schutz and Anthony Matero for handling the day-

to-day operations and the lecture presentations, EugeneScharf for special transportation services, Sandra Bossickand Kelly Sadler for overseeing the financial and organi-zational details, Anton Kurtz for drafting the web text, andEmily McLaughlin for maintaining the website. Specialthanks go to Karen Braas and Margaret Vizzard foreverything from program design to scientific sessionorganization. To the University of Vermont Conferenceand Event Planners, we thank Maureen Cartier, DonnaO’Brien, and Jeffrey Warden for handling all contractualand logistic matters, creating the secured web-basedregistration system and launching the symposium website.To the Equinox Spa and Resort, we thank GordanaKendricks and Janet Walsh for creating such a superbvenue. We also gratefully acknowledge the invaluable helpand insights from Terry Moody in organizing the meetingand program, and we (Victor May and Rodney L. Parsons)also thank Illana Gozes for her generosity in overseeing thepublication of these proceedings.

I (Illana Gozes) would like to deeply thank andcongratulate Victor May and Rodney L. Parsons forexcellent organization of a wonderful meeting includingtruly exciting scientific exchange in a beautiful setting. I amalso grateful for their participation and invaluable contri-bution to the Summer Neuropeptide Conference thatfollowed and covered (among others) novel peptides,peptide processing, diseases of the nervous system, andtranslational research. The meeting featured leading figuresin neuropeptide research, including Fleur Strand that wasinspirational in the initiation of this annual conference. I(Illana Gozes) hope to welcome you all to the next SummerNeuropeptide Conference on October 22–24, 2008, in TelAviv, Israel.

Finally, to all our friends and colleagues, thank you forattending the Symposium in Vermont. It was a rareprivilege to host the event in our backyard, and despitethe long journey for many of you, we hope you found themeeting to be a worthy, meaningful, and enjoyableexperience. It is always a pleasure meeting old acquaintan-ces, making new friends, and sharing ideas in a collegialenvironment. Of course, we are all terribly saddened by thepassing of Akira Arimura at the close of 2007 and wededicate these proceedings to him in his memory. Until ournext meeting in Kagoshima, Japan, our best wishes in allyour endeavors.

2 J Mol Neurosci (2008) 36:1–2