COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING & SCIENCE
The Next Gen Conversations: Albany @ Tech
The 2nd Next Gen. Conversation will be held Tuesday June 9- Saturday June 13, 2026 at Louisiana Tech University.
A planning meeting will be held Saturday June 7 to Tuesday June 10, 2025, in Ruston, Louisiana.
The Conversations are supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation Award Number 2412981.
Conference Publications
The Albany Conversations are now the Next Generation Conversations: Albany @ Ruston
Biophysical Reviews (2024), in press. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12551-024-01215-4
Bishop TC, Thayer KM, and Young R.
Book of Abstracts. The 1st Next Generation Conversations: Albany at Ruston 2024 (The 21st Albany Conversation)
Journal of Biomolecular Structure and Dynamics. 42(S1) 2024 https://doi.org/10.1080/07391102.2024.2384693
Freely Available Book of Abstracts
The Next Generation Conversations: Albany @ Louisiana Tech
Professor Ramaswamy H. Sarma selected Louisiana Tech University to host the Next Generation Conversations thanks to the University’s location and internationally renowned Physics program. Professor Ramaswamy will attend as a special guest of honor, and the keynote lecture will be delivered by Professor Wilma Olson of Rutgers University. Wilma has attended all previous Conversations. As with earlier Conversations, leaders from around the world at the Next Gen. Conversations will present posters and give talks on current developments in the following areas of structural biology.
| Cryo-Electron Microscopy | Nuclear Pore Complex- Transport between the Nucleus and the Cytoplasm |
| Protein Dynamics in the Living Cytoplas | Nuclear Pore Complex- Transport between the Nucleus and the Cytoplasm |
| Intrinsically Disordered Proteins: Evolution and Function | Drugs: Design and Discovery |
| Multiscale Genome Organization | DNA: Nanotechnology |
| Nucleosomes and Chromatin | Big Data, Machine and Deep Learning |
| R Loops and Genome Dynamics | Sequencing & Structural Dynamics: Single Molecules |
Albany Conversations History
In 1979, Professor Ramaswamy H. Sarma invited a few of his scientific colleagues for a Conversation at the State University of New York in Albany. Since then the Albany Conversations on Biomolecular Structure and Dynamics have continued every other year at SUNY. The Conversations now include about 250-300 scientists from over 20 countries. Each five-day Albany Conversation began on a Tuesday in early June (of an odd year) with a welcome dinner and celebration, a Russian-Israeli party on Thursday night, evening addresses by one or two Nobel Laureates, and a Big Feast on Friday. Scientific sessions for each Conversation covered a wide range of computational, theoretical, and experimental aspects of biomolecular structure and dynamics. Speakers ranged from budding students to world-renowned experts. Posters were displayed for the duration of the meetings and served as conversation starters. International collaborations were forged and several Nobel Laureates can trace their career development to the Albany Conversations.
After 20 Conversations spanning a 40-year period, Professor Sarma is retiring and seeking to hand over the Conversation to the next generation. A critical element of the success of the Albany Conversations has always been an environment, isolated from distractions, that supports extended conversations and fosters lasting relationships. After careful consideration, Louisiana Tech University in Ruston, Louisiana, was identified as providing an ideal setting for continuing the Conversations.