Conferences

Boden Conference provides international focus for Heme Oxygenase

The 8th International Conference on Heme Oxygenases, BioIron and Oxidative Stress was held in Sydney in October 2014 at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research. The conference brought together 152 delegates, including 93 international visitors from 17 countries across the Asia–Pacific, Europe and the Americas.

The conference opened with the Tony McDonagh Memorial Lecture delivered by Emeritus Professor David Lightner from the University of Nevada. David provided a fascinating insight into the history of bile pigments and the development of phototherapy for neonatal jaundice.

A key feature of the conference was the integration of the closely related disciplines of heme oxygenases, iron and oxidative stress. This trans-disciplinary approach afforded a variety of keynote speakers, including Professor Iqbal Hamza (University of Maryland), Professor Masao Ikeda-Saito (Tohoku University), Professor Young-Joon Surh, and Professor Ashley Bush (University of Melbourne), with a ‘bench to bedside’ flavour. The keynote talks were complemented by a number of invited speakers as well as speakers selected from abstracts across the three disciplines.

A significant component of the scientific program provided a forum for students and early- and mid-career researchers to present their data and liaise with experts in their fields. There were a number of outstanding presentations given by young investigators.

Fenner Conference asks the hard questions

The 2014 Fenner Conference on the Environment, Addicted to growth? How to move to a steady state economy in Australia, was the first conference in Australia to fully explore the ‘endless growth’ economy versus a ‘steady state’ economy. Held at the University of New South Wales in October, it brought together experts from Australia and around the world, and featured as keynote speaker Dr Brian Czech, President of the Center for the Advancement of a Steady State Economy in Washington, USA.

The conference had six themes:

• Why the growth economy is broken: the environmental science of endless growth
• Capitalism and the steady state economy—uneasy bedfellows?
• Key aspects of a steady state economy
• Throughput and consumerism—a key elephant in the room
• Ethics, equity and equality
• Policy and political process towards a steady state economy

The conference participants included ecological economists, environmental scientists and social scientists. It also featured modellers, environmental ethicists, sustainability academics, mining experts, experts on not for profit business, social commentators, business people and environmentalists.

Video: Watch the conference opening address by Dr Brian Czech