A Viral Metagenomics Study of Honey Bee Colony Collapse Disorder Event Date: October 24, 2007 12:00 Noon EDT; 9:00 a.m. PDT; 5 PM GMT Brought to you by the Science/AAAS Business Office Best viewed on Internet Explorer 6 or better.   Real Player   Real Media Audio (16k) For best results when using Real Media, first upgrade to RealPlayer v11.   Windows Media Player   Windows Media Audio (16k)     Colony collapse disorder (CCD) among honey bee populations in the United States has resulted in the loss of between 50% and 90% of hive colonies. Previous studies have pointed to the possibility that an infectious agent could be involved. A recent study published in Science magazine used unbiased metagenomic analysis to survey microflora present in normal and CCD-affected hives to determine whether a pathological agent could be linked to CCD. The authors found that the presence of one virus, Israeli acute paralysis virus of bees (IAPV), showed a strong correlation with colony collapse disorder. In addition to the important economical implications, this work also represents a novel use for massively parallel next generation sequencing technology which has enabled this type of high level metagenomic study. You will hear our panel, which includes two of the study’s authors, discussing: how metagenomics can be applied in the discovery of unknown pathogens the importance of study design and data analysis in metagenomics research how recent technological advances have made this type of study possible   Speakers: W. Ian Lipkin, M.D., Professor of Epidemiology and Professor of Neurology and Pathology, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, New York, NY Dr Lipkin has a BA from Sarah Lawrence College, where he studied cultural anthropology, philosophy, and literature, and an M.D. from Rush Medical College in Chicago. He did his postgraduate training at the Queen Square Institute of Neurology in London and his Medical training at the University of Pittsburgh, University of Washington, and the University of California, San Francisco, followed by a Fellowship in Neurovirology and Molecular Neurobiology at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. Dr Likpin is currently head of a 30-person laboratory at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health and has won a number of awards during his career; including being named Ellison Medical Foundation Senior Scholar in Global Infectious Diseases in 2001. He sits on the Faculty of 1000 (Virology) and is recognized internationally for his work on the development and application of new technologies to pathogen discovery, and the role of immune and microbial factors in neurologic and neuropsychiatric diseases. Michael Egholm, PhD, Vice President of Research & Development , 454 Life Sciences, Branford, CT Dr. Egholm earned a Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of Copenhagen in Denmark. Dr. Egholm joined the 454 management team from Molecular Staging, where he served as Senior Vice President of Research and Development. While at Molecular Staging, Dr. Egholm led the development of the REPLI-g single tube whole genome amplification product as well as their industry leading blood protein profiling platform. Prior to that, Dr. Egholm was at Applied Biosystems working on Peptide Nucleic Acids, of which he was a co-inventor.   Moderator: Sean Sanders, Ph.D., Commercial Editor, Science/AAAS Sean Sanders did his undergraduate training at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, and his Ph.D. under Sir Dillwyn Williams at the University of Cambridge, UK, supported by the Wellcome Trust. Following postdoctoral training at the National Institutes of Health and Georgetown University, Dr. Sanders joined TranXenoGen, a startup biotechnology company in Massachusetts working on avian transgenics. Pursuing his parallel passion for writing and editing, Dr. Sanders joined BioTechniques as an editor in 2004 before recently taking the position of Commercial Editor at Science/AAAS.   ___________________________________________________________________________________________________   Test Your System   Help   Download Real Player   Download Windows Media Player