An annual retreat will bring distant and local investigators, students, and mentors together to discuss results and plan future work.

Subsurface Biosphere Initiative & IGERT Workshop
June 17-19, 2007
Newport, Oregon

Sunday Evening, June 17

7:15 Lew Semprini, SBI Executive Committee Chair
Introductory talk about SBI and Workshop

7:30 Keynote Speaker: Mary Firestone, Professor, Department: Environmental Science, Policy & Management Division: Ecosystem Sciences, University of California - Berkeley
"Can Molecular Microbial Ecology Increase Our Understanding Of Subsurface Processes?"

8:30 Campfire Social

Monday Morning, June 18

8:00 Markus Kleber, Oregon State University
"The Reactivity of Biogeochemical Interfaces"

9:00 Peter Nico, Advanced Light Source (ALS) at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab
"Synchrotron Spectromicroscopy and Biogeochemical Interface"

10:00 Break

10:15 Stephanie Boyle, Recent IGERT PhD Graduate
"Bacterial and Fungal Contributions to Soil Nitrogen Cycling"

10:45 Shawn Starkenburg, Oregon State University IGERT Student
"A Genome-Enabled Comparison of Metabolic Variations within the Genus Nitrobacter"

11:15 Break for lunch

Monday afternoon, June 18

1:15 Lew Semprini, update from the SBI Executive Committee Chair

1:35 Dave Myrold, update from the IGERT Director

1:45 Dorthe Wildenschild, Oregon State University
"Non-destructive 3D imaging of biofilm architecture with x-ray tomography"

2:15 Brian Wood, Oregon State University
"Biolfilms in Porous Media: An Overview of Progress
on Theory and Characterization in 3-Dimensions"

2:45 Break

3:00 Andy Sabalowsky, Oregon State University IGERT Student
"Comparison of attached vs. suspended growth for anaerobic reductive
dechlorination of high TCE concentrations"

3:30 2007 IGERT Group Process Training Students
"Anaerobic Oxidation of Methane and GPT: Highlights and Lessons Learned"

3:30 Free Time and Dinner Break

Monday Evening, June 18

7:00 Student's Power Point Poster Presentations and Open Bar

Tuesday Morning, June 19

8:00 Tommy Phelps, Oakridge National Lab
"Life and times in the deep subsurface"

9:00 Jessica Goin, Portland State University IGERT Student
"Biosedimentology of Thermal Features of the Uzon Caldera,
Kamchatka, Russia"

9:30 Time to Check Out and Bring Luggage to Cars/Conference Room

10:00 Rebecca Poulson, Oregon State University IGERT Student
"Trace Metal Cycling in Continental Margin Sediments - Insights from Molybdenum Isotopes "

10:30 Mark Nielsen, Oregon State University IGERT Student
"Bug Juice: Microbial Fuel Cells in Marine Sediments"

11:00 Other business

IGERT students will also participate at a national or international symposium or workshop.

Graduate education and career development will be enhanced with special Earth's Subsurface Biosphere sessions to be held in conjunction with international meetings. Suitable venues for these special sessions are the International Symposium for Subsurface Microbiology, the American Society of Microbiology, or the American Geophysical Union (which has a new and rapidly growing Biogeosciences Section).

The symposia are planned for the middle of the third year and the end of the fifth year of the program and will allow students opportunities to present their research and to make contacts with scientists outside the IGERT program.