Dear Colleagues,

I am pleased to invite you to attend the 55th Annual Meeting of the Society for Birth Defects Research and Prevention, June 27–July 1, 2015, at the Hôtel Bonaventure Montréal, in Montréal, Québec, Canada.  Mark your calendars now and plan to be there!  For U.S. government employees, we recognize it will take longer than usual to get your travel approved—so don’t delay, the Society for Birth Defects Research and Prevention needs your participation in our annual meeting!  Let me know if there is anything we can do to help justify your travel.

The theme for this year’s meeting is “Understanding Birth Defects and Reproductive Health: From Basic to Translational Research.” The Program Committee, chaired by Tacey E.K. White, has put together an outstanding program around this theme. The Education Committee, chaired by Janet R. Hardy, has developed Education Courses entitled “Occupational and Environmental Exposures: Reproductive and Developmental Hazards in the Workplace and Home” and “Ethics and Ethical Conundrums” that fit the theme as well. The program offers an exciting variety of scientific sessions on topics related to birth defects including cerebral palsy, assisted reproductive technology, microbiomes, epigenetics, contraception in clinical trials, regulatory neurodevelopmental testing, gene-environment interactions, skeletal malformations, and a student and postdoctoral career workshop. Once again, we are pleased to offer joint sessions and a joint registration fee to maximize interactions with our sister societies, the Neurobehavioral Society for Birth Defects Research and Prevention (NBTS) and Organization of Teratology Information Specialists (OTIS). In addition, International Neurotoxicology Association (INA) will be meeting jointly with NBTS during the 2015 meeting.

I would also like to invite you to present your latest research findings at the annual meeting.  As a reminder, the abstract deadline is February 15, 2015. So plan now to submit an abstract for your work.

Our Annual Meeting provides us with the opportunity to promote our shared vision and scientific identity as researchers focused on the causes, manifestations, mechanisms, intervention, and prevention of birth defects and developmental and reproductive toxicology. It also is an expression of our scientific diversity, as a Society of clinicians, scientists, and science policy regulators from academic, industrial, and government sectors. There is no better occasion to learn about the latest scientific research in teratology, to interact with scientists whom you have not yet met, and to network with old friends and colleagues. I look forward to seeing you in Montreal and hearing about your latest activities!

Sincerely,
Mary Alice Smith, PhD
Society for Birth Defects Research and Prevention President

Birth defects and reproductive and developmentally-mediated disorders constitute a major public health concern in the world today. Human development can be affected not only by drugs and chemicals but also by diet, genetics, maternal health, and socioeconomic factors.  The Society for Birth Defects Research and Prevention strives to understand and protect against potential hazards to developing embryos, fetuses, children, and adults, by bringing together scientific knowledge from diverse fields such as cell and molecular biology, developmental biology and toxicology, reproduction and endocrinology, nutritional biochemistry, genetics, and epidemiology, as well as the clinical disciplines of prenatal medicine, pediatrics, obstetrics, neonatology, medical genetics, and teratogen risk counseling.

The 2015 Annual Meeting provides a unique forum for this diverse group of scientists and clinicians to present and discuss the latest scientific and clinical information on causes and prevention of abnormal development and reproduction, and for trainees to discuss topics of mutual interest with seasoned investigators.

The theme of the 2015 meeting is “Understanding Birth Defects and Reproductive Health: From Basic to Translational Research.”,  and will feature the following symposia and workshops:

• Epigenetic and genetic alterations in progeny resulting from paternal exposures
• Developmental risks of Assisted Reproductive Technologies
• Vascular defects as a causative factor in human skeletal malformations
• Oxidative stress as a mechanism of teratogenicity
• Microbiomes in development
• Contraception in clinical trials: preventing and managing inadvertent exposures during pregnancy
• Genetic-environmental interactions of common birth defects
• Cerebral palsy: causes, prevention and current treatment strategies
• Postnatal reproductive development: mechanisms regulating puberty across species best predictors for human risk
• Harmonized approaches to regulatory neurodevelopmental testing and data interpretation

Education Courses will include:

• Reproductive and developmental hazards in the workplace and home
• Research ethics surrounding reproductive clinical practice
• Gene manipulation and genome editing to understand congenital diseases

There will be joint sessions with the Neurobehavioral Society for Birth Defects Research and Prevention (NBTS) and the Organization of Teratology Information Specialists (OTIS; Mother to Baby). There will be career development events designed specifically for students and new and early stage investigators, such as a Career Development Luncheon on topics including publishing a manuscript, choosing life-long mentors, writing for success, and integrative thinking.

If you are a scientist or clinician in any of these  areas, you need to be at the 2015 Society for Birth Defects Research and Prevention meeting in Montréal!

• Researchers whose cutting edge research can be applied to the study of birth defects and reproductive disorders, such as research in embryology, genetics,  mechanistic toxicology, stem cells and gene therapy, adverse outcomes pathways, computational toxicology, genomics, proteomics or metabolomics.
• Clinicians involved in early diagnosis and treatment of birth defects, technologies to identify birth defects or adverse pregnancy outcomes, and mechanisms of abnormal development
• Epidemiologists working to identification relationships between developmental disorders and exposures to drugs, chemicals and pathogens,
• Regulators responsible for interpreting and managing regulations based on reproductive and developmental endpoints,
• Developmental and Reproductive Toxicologists who develop and/or test pharmaceuticals or chemicals for developmental and reproductive effects,
• Pharmacologists who develop and design new drugs and chemicals for use during pregnancy and early childhood.
• Educators teaching developmental and reproductive biology/toxicology, serve as mentors to students, or develop training materials for scientists, clinicians or pregnant women,
• Students with a desire to learn more in developmental or reproductive toxicology, and diseases of developmental origin, and who want a career in government, academia, or industry in the field of birth defects research.

Register early and save.

The meeting will be held at the Hôtel Bonaventure Montréal, located approximately 20 miles from The Montréal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau (YUL) International Airport. Located opposite Montréal Central train station (with an indoor path for easy access) and above the Bonaventure metro station, the Hôtel Bonaventure Montréal is steps away from major attractions, the business district, and public transportation.