Non-coding RNA World 2024: Exploring Mechanisms, Designing Medicines
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Non-coding RNA World 2024: Exploring Mechanisms, Designing Medicines
Part of the Noncoding RNA World: From Mechanism to Therapy series
14th May 2024
11th June 2024
15th July 2024
29th July 2024
23rd September 2024
Ncrna, Genetics, RNA, Molecular Biology
Welcome from the Chairs
Dear Colleagues,
We are delighted to announce the upcoming conference, Non-coding RNA World 2024: Exploring Mechanisms, Designing Medicines (ncRNA 2024), which will be held from 07–09 October 2024.
Following our successful conference ncRNA 2021, we now propose meeting you in the beautiful city of Basel, Switzerland.
The field of RNA continues on its meteoric ascent, with non-coding RNAs in the vanguard. The field continues to grow, with new transcripts discovered wherever one looks in molecular biology, physiology, disease, and across the tree of life. Discoveries are propelled, in part, by dramatically advancing technologies that can now sequence full-length single RNA molecules at single-cell and sub-cellular resolutions. The sequencing of many thousands of species’ genomes will further drive evolutionary and informatic efforts to map, catalog, and model ncRNAs. And, of course, our power to manipulate and engineer RNAs using synthetic oligonucleotides and genome-editing technologies opens breathtaking vistas for medicine and biotechnology, as recognized by the 2023 Nobel Prize won by Karikó and Weissman.
ncRNA 2024 will bring together the international ncRNA community to share and explore the latest advances in our field. The conference will cover a broad range of topics, from basic biology to medical and technological applications. The sessions will take molecular biology through the topics of disease mechanisms, therapies, technologies, and bioinformatic approaches. Each session will be anchored by leading international speakers. We are also committed to showcasing the work of early-stage researchers, and the majority of the oral presentations will be selected from submitted abstracts. Crucially, the program will provide plenty of opportunities to casually network and mingle via poster sessions and refreshment breaks.
We look forward to welcoming you to Basel in October 2024. The city, with its picturesque autumnal scenery, coupled with its renowned cultural and scientific institutions, will create an inspiring atmosphere for our conference.
Ana Eulalio and Rory Johnson
ncRNA 2024 Chairs
Conference Secretariat
Sponsoring Opportunities
For information regarding sponsorship and exhibition opportunities, please contact us.
Join us on LinkedIn Events!
If you want to stay updated with the latest information, or if you want to connect with your fellow researchers before, during, and after the event, then be sure to join the Non-coding RNA World 2024: Exploring Mechanisms, Designing Medicines LinkedIn Event.
See you over there!
Follow the conversation on Twitter / X with #ncRNA2024
Event Chairs
Dr. Rory Johnson leads groundbreaking research in Precision RNA Therapeutics for Lung Cancer as an Associate Professor at University College Dublin, School of Biology and Environmental Science. Focused on enigmatic long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs), his work blends CRISPR genome editing, bioinformatics, and oligonucleotide drugs to combat non-small cell lung cancer. With a rich academic background, including a Wellcome Trust scholarship, postdoctoral research in Singapore, and leadership in the Genomics of Long noncoding RNAs in Disease (GOLD Lab), Dr. Johnson is at the forefront of decoding the human genome and its role in disease. His move to UCD, supported by an SFI Future Research Leaders grant, continues his vital quest to understand the noncoding genome in cancer.
Faculty of Natural Sciences, Department of Life Sciences, Imperial College London
Dr. Eulalio joined the Department of Life Sciences at Imperial College London in 2023. She established her research group at the University of Würzburg in 2012, later relocating to the University of Coimbra in 2017. Her research explores host-bacterial interactions, focusing on microRNAs and bacterial intracellular lifestyles, particularly in pathogens like Salmonella Typhimurium and Staphylococcus aureus. Dr. Eulalio employs genome-wide systems biology techniques, shedding light on novel molecular players in these interactions. Her work promises insights into pathogenesis and antibiotic treatments.
Event Committee
Department of Medicine, Fleischer Institute for Diabetes and Metabolism (FIDAM), Einstein-Mount Sinai Diabetes Research Center (ES-DRC), Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York, USA
Prof. Dr. Gaetano Santulli received his MD and PhD at the University of Naples “Federico II”. A physician scientist, Prof. Santulli completed his postdoctoral training at Columbia University Medical Center in New York City, supported by an AHA fellowship and a Scientist Development Grant. As a cardiologist, he has authored more than 100 publications, including peer-reviewed articles in high-impact journals, book chapters, and medical books. Prof. Santulli’s expertise comprises both clinical and basic research topics, including hypertension, diabetes, angiogenesis, heart failure, arrhythmias, vascular disorders, and skeletal muscle disease. He is a member of several international academic societies, including the New York Academy of Sciences, American Heart Association (AHA), American Diabetes Association, European Society of Cardiology, Endocrine Society, American Association for the Advancement of Science, European Association of Heart Failure, European Association of Echocardiography, Acute Cardiovascular Care Association, and European Association of Percutaneous Cardiovascular Interventions. He serves on the Editorial Boards of numerous medical Journals.
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Faculty of Medicine, Institute of Molecular Medicine, University of Lisbon, Portugal
Francisco Enguita obtained his Ph.D. in Microbial Genetics from the University of Salamanca, Spain, with research concerning the genetic and biochemical characterization of beta-lactam antibiotic biosynthesis in Streptomyces species. He then moved to the Institute of Chemical and Biological Technology from NOVA University Lisbon in Portugal, where he obtained a long-term EMBO fellowship to develop a structural biology project based on the use of X-ray crystallography. He became a group leader in the same institution in 2004, pursuing structural studies of adhesion proteins from pathogenic bacteria. In 2006, he rose to senior researcher in the Institute of Molecular Medicine at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Lisbon, where he is now an Assistant Professor. His broad research interests are mainly related to the field of non-coding RNAs, specifically those involved in human disease. His lab applies a multi-disciplinary approach using structural biology, biochemistry, genetics, and bioinformatics to unravel the role of non-coding RNAs in human diseases. He is currently investigating the use of circulating miRNAs as biomarkers of cardiac diseases.
Laboratory of RNA Cancer Biology, Department of Oncology, LKI, KU Leuven, Belgium
Prof. Eleonora Leucci is an Associate Professor and Principal Investigator at KU Leuven in Belgium, where she is Head of the TRACE PDX (patient-derived tumor xenograft) platform. Her work on long non-coding RNAs (lncRNA) in the context of cancer has been published in some of the most prestigious journals, including Nature, Cancer Cell, and Blood. Her Laboratory for RNA Cancer Biology studies RNA metabolism in cancer. They aim to characterize long non-coding RNAs important for cancer development and progression. They apply cutting-edge molecular biology and biochemistry techniques coupled with in vivo PDX studies with the ultimate goal of identifying novel biomarkers and therapeutic targets.
Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Aarhus University, Denmark
Dr. Ulf Andersson Vang Ørom is an Associate Professor at the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics of Aarhus University. Dr. Ørom’s lab focuses on non-coding RNA in the nucleus of the cell and how non-coding RNAs are processed and mediate its functions. They utilize molecular biology techniques, RNA sequencing, and bioinformatics. Other important focuses of his lab include the processing and regulation of primary miRNA biogenesis and the role of long non-coding RNA in transcriptional regulation with an emphasis on enhancers. His work explores new roles of RNA modifications in developing new and sensitive methods using RNA labeling and size-fractionation purification combined with next-generation (Illumina) and third-generation sequencing (Nanopore DRS). He is the recipient of a Frontier Grant from the Lundbeck Foundation for the research of RNA-targeted treatments for Huntington’s disease.
Transgenerational Epigenetics & Small RNA Biology, Sorbonne University, CNRS, Developmental Biology Laboratory, Institut de Biologie Paris-Seine, France
Dr. Hubé is a researcher at CNRS. He was recruited after several post-doctoral studies in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, and then by the Hematology Department of the Cochin Institute, before joining Claire Francastel’s Lab at the Epigenetic and Cell Fate Unit. In 2024, he transitioned to the lab of Clément Carré and Laure Teysset at Sorbonne University. Since 2014, Florent has also been an Associate Editor for Frontiers in Genetics section non-coding RNA and Editor for non-coding RNA (at MDPI). His scientific interests have focused on the expanding functional diversity of the RNA world in mammalian cells and the extraordinary reservoir of regulatory molecules that it provides to ultimately control the differentiation of progenitor cells. He also documented cases of introns that escape degradation and release precursors of small regulatory non-coding RNAs directly through splicing. He chose human muscle differentiation as a cellular model because it is one of the best-characterized systems in humans, and because he has access to cells from patients with splicing defects that cause Myotonic Dystrophy through a long-standing collaboration with the Institute of Myology.
Molecular Hallmarks of Cancer Laboratory, Flinders Centre for Innovation in Cancer, Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia
Since his undergraduate studies, Professor Conn has loved the challenges and opportunities of Molecular and Cellular Biology. He has worked on mammalian cell biology in his postdoctoral positions at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (France) and the Centre for Cancer Biology (Australia). This is where he discovered how canonical RNAs are the exception, rather than the rule. Uncovering how an entire class of non-coding RNAs, called circular RNAs, are formed and regulated across cell differentiation led to an important publication in the field. At Flinders University, he continues to research how these circular RNAs impact cellular development and cancer (NHMRC Investigator Leadership Grant and Project funding). His laboratory focuses particularly on brain cancer. He is a proud founding member of the Australian Brain Alliance, EMCR Brain Science Network, which supports interdisciplinary research among Australian EMCRs. He has published seminal papers on circular RNAs and other molecular biology-rich projects in eukaryotes in Cell, Nature Biotechnology, Nature Plants, The EMBO Journal, RNA, Genome Biology, and other top-ranking journals.
Oncogenomics Unit, Core Research Laboratory, Istituto per lo Studio, la Prevenzione e la Rete Oncologica, Pisa, Italy
and Institute of Clinical Physiology, National Research Council, Pisa, Italy
Dr. Poliseno is the Principal Investigator of the Oncogenomics Unit at the Core Research Laboratory of the Istituto per lo Studio, la Prevenzione e la Rete Oncologica. She is also a Senior Staff Scientist at the CNR Institute of Clinical Physiology in Pisa, Italy. At the Poliseno lab, research activities are focused on the study of melanoma, the most aggressive form of skin cancer. In particular, the group aims to achieve a deeper understanding of the biology of BRAF, an oncogene that is frequently mutated in melanoma and represents a very powerful cancer driver, as well as a drug target. They study: BRAF RNA and protein isoforms; the coding and non-coding regulators of mutant BRAFV600E expression (with particular emphasis on microRNAs and ceRNAs); the interactors of BRAFV600E protein; and the coding and non-coding effectors of BRAFV600E kinase activity. The group’s goal is to identify new drugs that can be combined with and improve the efficacy of current BRAFV600E inhibitors. They also aim to develop an innovative strategy for selective delivery of chemical and RNA-based drugs inside melanoma cells. This strategy is based on the anticancer vaccine attenuated Listeria monocytogenes.
Research Center of Functional Genomics, Biomedicine and Translational Medicine, Iuliu Hatieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Romania
Prof. Dr. Berindan-Neagoe is a Professor of Medical Biotechnology and the Director of the Research Center for Functional Genomics, Biomedicine, and Translational Medicine at the Iuliu Hatieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy. She was trained in Functional Genomics at the Institut Gustave Roussy under the supervision of Dr Lazar, was a Visiting Professor and Fulbright fellow in the Department of Experimental Therapeutics at the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, and is a national expert at the European Commission in the Subgroup Cancer. She received the Ad Astra Prize in 2018 for being the leading scientist in Romania in Life Sciences. She coordinated, during the last 13 years, more than 50 research projects with a total amount of over 13 million euros in equipment, reagents, and personnel. Among her major research interests are (a) genomic profiling of tumors for the identification of new biomarkers, (b) drug discovery and drug repurposing, (c) target drug delivery, and (d) tumor microenvironment and spatial biology/spatial transcriptomics of tumors and the response to different drugs.
TErBio: Transgenerational Epigenetics & Small RNA Biology, Developmental Biology Laboratory, Institut de Biologie Paris-Seine, Sorbonne University, France
Prof. Dr. Carré’s team studies the Biology of RNAs, particularly the small RNAs involved in regulating gene expression and Transposable Elements (TEs). They are also interested in RNA post-transcriptional modifications that play a fundamental role in RNA biogenesis and fate. In metazoans, three types of small RNAs have been described, whose specificity differs according to the Argonaute protein with which they interact: microRNA (miRNA), small interfering RNA (siRNA), and PIWI-interacting RNAs (piRNA). TEs, which are present in all genomes, can transpose and cause possibly deleterious mutations. In Drosophila, their expression is controlled by piRNAs in the gonads and by siRNAs in somatic tissues. His team’s projects aim to better understand the dynamics (activation and evolution) of piRNA clusters in the heterochromatic locus from which piRNAs are maturated and, using functional screens, characterize genes involved in siRNA- and piRNA-dependent repression.
Keynote Speakers
School of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Medicine and Sciences, King’s College, London, UK
Mauro Giacca is Head of the School of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Medicine and Sciences, and Professor of Cardiovascular Sciences at the Faculty of Medicine and Life Sciences, King’s College London. He served as the Director-General of the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB) until 2019. He is the President of the European Section of the International Society for Heart Research (ISHR) and serves on the scientific boards of numerous academic international institutions. Prof. Giacca is also a founder of Forcefield Therapeutics and Heqet Therapeutics, two recent startups that develop cardiovascular biologics, and the co-founder of Purespring Therapeutics, which operates in the field of AAV gene therapy of the kidney. He is an elected Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences of the United Kingdom. Prof. Giacca is an expert in the generation of viral vectors for cardiovascular applications and the development of novel biologics for cardiac repair and regeneration in patients with myocardial infarction and heart failure. He has published over 400 papers in international journals, in addition to several reviews and chapters in books and university textbooks.
Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology (Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science), Chinese Academy of Sciences, China
Prof. Ling-Ling Chen is a Principal Investigator at the CAS Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science and the Associate Director of the Center’s State Key Laboratory of Molecular Biology. She has received numerous honors and awards, including the HHMI International Research Scholar in 2017 and the Young Investigator Award of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2018. Her lab’s long-term goal is to discover new regulatory RNA species and study their biogenesis and mechanisms of action in mammalian cells. They are particularly interested in identifying new RNA species in mammalian genomes by taking advantage of genome-wide approaches and computational analyses, exploring their biogenesis and new modes of gene regulation by lncRNAs and circular RNAs with molecular/cell biological and biochemical approaches, understanding the regulatory roles of particular ncRNAs in nuclear architecture and function through genome editing and cell biology, and investigating the function of evolutionary long noncoding RNAs by using human embryonic stem cells as models to gain insights into their regulatory roles in human diseases.
Invited Speakers
Gunter Meister is the head of the Department of Biochemistry I at the University of Regensburg, Germany. He obtained his PhD from the University of Munich and the Max-Planck-Institute of Biochemistry, working on RNA–protein complexes. Thereafter, he joined the group of Tom Tuschl at Rockefeller University in New York (USA), where he worked on RNA interference and small non-coding RNAs. After his postdoctoral time in New York, he returned to the Max-Planck-Institute of Biochemistry as an independent group leader and head of the “RNA Biology” group. In 2009, he accepted the chair for Biochemistry at the University of Regensburg. Gunter Meister has received an EMBO long-term fellowship and an Emmy Noether fellowship from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft. He also received ERC starting and consolidator grants. He was awarded the Max-Planck Junior Research Award, the research award of the Engelhorn Foundation, the Schering Young Investigator Award, and the Theodor Bücher Medal. His lab’s research investigates non-coding RNA and RNA modification pathways in mammalian cells by using RNA-seq to profile short and long non-coding RNAs in cancer and other diseases. For example, using biochemical approaches, they identified hundreds of proteins that sequence-specifically bind to pre-miRNAs, and are currently investigating the biological functions of these proteins.
Groningen Biomolecular Sciences and Biotechnology Institute, University of Groningen, The Netherlands
Dr. Incarnato’s lab pioneers next-generation sequencing approaches for the interrogation of RNA structures in living cells, which enable studying entire transcriptomes in a single experiment. The lab is well known for a number of important computational tools for RNA structure analyses, including RNA Framework, DRACO, and SHAPEwarp, as well as implementing the novel compound 2-aminopyridine-3-carboxylic acid imidazolide (2A3), currently the most efficient reagent for RNA structure mapping in cells. They were the first to report, at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the full structure of the SARS-CoV-2 genome in living infected host cells, which identified several conserved RNA targets among coronaviruses, amenable for RNA-targeted drug development. The current main research focuses of his lab include deconvolving RNA secondary structure ensembles in living cells to elucidate the biological functions of alternative RNA conformations, and developing novel methods to identify and characterize therapeutically active small molecules binding to RNA.
Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
Prof. Xue received his PhD in biochemistry and molecular biology from Wuhan University in 2010. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine from 2010–2015. He joined the faculty of the Institute of Biophysics in 2015. Prof. Xue was awarded the National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars in 2020, the VCANBIO Awards for Biosciences and Medicine in 2021, and the Wuxi Apptec Life Science and Chemistry Award in 2022. His team focuses on understanding how RNA-binding protein and noncoding RNA control transcription under physiological or pathological conditions. He has developed several novel techniques for the unbiased global mapping of RNA-binding protein and noncoding RNA binding sites. His team recently illustrated elegant mechanisms of RNA-binding protein-mediated RNA–RNA interactions in transcriptional regulation.
Department of Genetics, Physical Anthropology and Animal Physiology of the University of the Basque Country, Spain
Dr. Castellanos obtained her PhD in Genetics from the University of the Basque Country (Spain) in 2010. She did a research stay at the University of Tampere (Finland) under the supervision of Dr. Marku Makki and Dr. Katri Lindfors, where she used three-dimensional cell cultures to describe different pathways involved in Celiac Disease development. In 2011, she joined the Laboratory of Dr. Sankar Ghosh at Columbia University (NY, USA), where she studied the implication of long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) in the immune and inflammatory response, discovering and functionally characterizing a novel lncRNA involved in the susceptibility to Celiac Disease. Dr. Castellanos is an Ikerbasque Associate at the University of the Basque Country, where she leads her own group. She is interested in the involvement of noncoding RNAs in the pathogenesis of autoimmune and inflammatory diseases and studies the influence of disease-associated SNPs in the functional disturbance of these RNAs. More recently, she has become interested in the epitranscriptomic alterations involved in different aspects of RNA regulation, and her group studies how SNPs and environmental factors can alter these epitranscriptomic signals influencing the inflammatory response that finally evolves in disease development.
Quantitative RNA Biology Group, Department of Molecular Biosciences, The Wenner-Gren Institute, Stockholm University, Sweden
Marc Friedländer undertook his undergraduate studies in bioinformatics at the University Copenhagen under the supervision of Anders Krogh and his PhD in Berlin under the supervision of Nikolaus Rajewsky. During his graduate studies, he developed miRDeep and miRDeep2, which are widely used computational methods for microRNA discovery. As an independent researcher and associate professor, he has established the Quantitative RNA Biology lab at SciLifeLab/Stockholm University. The group has recently developed agoTRIBE—the first method to experimentally map microRNA targets transcriptome-wide in single cells—and has discovered RNA fragments in historical and ancient samples, including the extinct Tasmanian tiger.
Department of Molecular Infection Biology II, Institute of Molecular Infection Biology, University of Würzburg, Bavaria, Germany
Professor Sharma is the Chair of Molecular Infection Biology II at the University of Würzburg. Her research focuses on how bacterial pathogens regulate their gene expression to adapt to changing environments or stress conditions. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Prof. Sharma, together with Prof. Chase Beisel, developed an RNA diagnostic platform to distinguish different respiratory viruses and virus variants based on CRISPR. The test, Leveraging Engineered tracrRNAs and On-target DNAs for PArallel RNA Detection (LEOPARD), can detect many RNAs simultaneously, potentially identifying several disease-related biomarkers. She was awarded a European Research Council Consolidator Grant in 2022. Research in her lab focuses on mechanisms of gene regulation in the gastric pathogen Helicobacter pylori and the related foodborne pathogen Campylobacter jejuni. They are especially interested in post-transcriptional regulation during stress response and virulence by small regulatory RNAs (sRNAs) and associated RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) as well as mechanisms and biology of CRISPR-Cas immune systems.
Department of Chemistry, New York University, New York, NY, USA
Prof Alisha Jones, who goes by Jonesy, is an Assistant Professor in Chemistry at New York University. Jonesy attended Miami University of Ohio for her undergraduate studies, working in the lab of Prof Michael Kennedy. She started as a crystallographer but, for reasons associated with a lack of luck, chose to explore the structural biology of biological systems through NMR instead. To do this, she joined the lab of Prof Gabriele Varani at the University of Washington in Seattle, where she earned her doctorate in Chemistry. There, she used NMR to develop peptide inhibitors of HIV replication based on the structure-based design approach, and also studied secondary structures of long noncoding RNAs using chemical probing techniques. Jonesy was a postdoc in the lab of Prof Michael Sattler in Munich, Germany, where she worked to study RNA–protein interactions, particularly involving RNAs that are long and sometimes noncoding (>500 nt in length), using integrative structural biology. Her team uses computational and experimental approaches to investigate the relationship between RNA conformational dynamics and RNA multifunctionality.
Institute for Molecular Oncology and Functional Genomics at the Technical University of Munich, Germany
Prof. Rad studies the molecular basis of tumor evolution in order to decipher processes such as degeneration, metastasis, or drug resistance. His team works at the interface of structural and functional genomics, systems biology, and translational medicine. A focus of his research is the development of genetic technologies and disease models for high-throughput perturbation of complex biological systems. The overarching goal of his work is to make discoveries from basic research usable for cancer therapy. Prof. Rad studied medicine in Budapest, Dresden, and Munich, where he received his doctorate from TUM. After working as a doctor in internal medicine at the Rechts der Isar Clinic, he conducted research for six years at the Wellcome Sanger Institute in Cambridge. Since 2012, he has held a professorship for translational oncology at TUM and led a DKTK working group at the German Cancer Research Center Heidelberg. He was appointed to his current position in 2019 and has since been director of the Institute for Molecular Oncology and Functional Genomics at TUM.
Architecture et Réactivité de l'ARN, Institut de Biologie Moléculaire et Cellulaire du CNRS, University of Strasbourg, France
Dr. Pfeffer’s research lab specializes in virology and small RNA profiling. The group analyzes the impact of virus infection on microRNAs and other small RNA expressions in cultured cells, mice, and patient samples. They study how a viral infection can impact biological pathways involving small ncRNAs. The objectives of his team are multiple and consist, on the one hand, of understanding the regulation of a family of small RNAs, called microRNAs, during viral infection and, on the other hand, of elucidating the importance of an antiviral defense mechanism based on the production of small interfering RNAs (siRNA) in mammals. Their work elucidates the molecular mechanisms involved in the viral replicative cycle and how the infected organism responds to viral infection at the cellular level. In the long term, they hope that their research will help develop new therapeutic approaches against viruses.
Institute of Molecular Biotechnology, Vienna Biocenter, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Austria
Dr. Jachowicz has been a Group Leader at IMBA, Vienna Biocenter, Austria, since August 2022. She obtained her BS and MS degrees in Biology and Psychology from the University of Warsaw. She did her PhD studies in IGBMC, France, and completed her postdoctoral studies in the lab of Prof. Mitch Guttman at Caltech, USA. Her research investigates how transposons and non-coding RNA regulate genome functions during early mammalian development. Her group aims to understand how the cell-specific transcription program and 3D genome architecture arise, are controlled, and interplay to determine the fate of each individual cell in a developing embryo. They use embryonic stem cells and early mouse embryos as model systems and employ novel, genome-wide technologies that can simultaneously measure 3D nuclear organization and transcriptomes in single cells.
Registration
The conference will be held fully in person; it is not possible to participate online. The registration fee includes attendance at all conference sessions, morning/afternoon coffee breaks, lunch, a conference bag, and a program book. Participation in the conference is considered final only once the registration fees have been paid. The number of participants is limited: once the number of paid registrations reaches the maximum number of participants, unpaid registrations will be canceled.
Please note that abstract submission and conference registration are two separate processes. During registration, please provide us with the same email address you used to submit your abstract(s). Otherwise, leave us a comment in the registration form, providing the email address used during the submission process. In addition, please use your institutional email address for both processes. If you are registering several people under the same registration order, please do not use the same email address for each person but their individual institutional email addresses. Thank you for your understanding.
Please note that, in order to finalize the scientific program in due time, at least one registration by any of the authors, denoted as the Covering Author, is required to cover the presentation and publication of any accepted abstract. The Covering Author registration deadline is 31 July 2024. Your abstract will be withdrawn if your registration is not complete by this date.
Group Registration: Groups of five or more attendees are offered a 10% discount on the registration fees. To enjoy this discount, you need to complete one multiple registration by selecting the number of people attending in each category (type of registration) during the first step of the registration process. Please note that no other discounts will be applicable.
Partnering Societies: Members from partnering societies are granted a 20% discount on all registration fees. Please make sure to provide us with proof that you are part of one of our partnering societies. Are you part of a society that isn't partnering with the conference? Contact us to discuss a possible partnership!
Certificate of Attendance: Participants of the event will be able to download an electronic Certificate of Attendance by accessing their dashboards on Sciforum.net once the event is concluded. The certificates will be found under the "My Certificates" category.
Reduced fees
If you are affiliated with a university in a low- or middle-income country, you are automatically eligible for a price reduction. However, please note that the reduced price will only be added to your registration when it is processed. This means that you do not have to pay the stated price immediately upon registration, and you will receive an invoice with the price adjustment after you have registered. You can find the list of low- and middle-income countries here.
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Early Bird Until 15th July 2024 |
Regular Until 23rd September 2024 |
Supported documents | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Academic | 500.00 CHF | 600.00 CHF | |
| Student | 300.00 CHF | 400.00 CHF |
Scanned copy or photograph of your current Student ID Card. |
| Non-Academic | 800.00 CHF | 900.00 CHF | |
| Chairs, Invited Speakers and Committee Members | Free | Free |
Active discounts
Group of 5: 10% discount
Society Discount: 20% discount
Note: Group size refers to the number of registered attendees in the same registration order.
Cancellation policy
| Cancellation of paid registration is possible under the terms listed below: | |
| > 2 months before the conference | Full refund but 100 CHF is retained for administration |
| > 1 month before the conference | Refund 50% of the applying fees |
| > 2 weeks before the conference | Refund 25% of the applying fees |
| < 2 weeks before the conference | No refund |
Disclaimer
In the unlikely event that MDPI deems it necessary to cancel the conference, all pre-paid registration fees will be reimbursed. MDPI shall not be liable for reimbursing the cost of travel or accommodation arrangements made by individual delegates.
Beware of unauthorized registration and hotel solicitations
Note that Sciforum is the only official registration platform for registering to ncRNA 2024 and that we are not associated with any hotel agency (other than those listed on the conference website). While other hotel resellers and travel agencies may contact you with offers for your trip, they are not endorsed by or affiliated with ncRNA 2024 or Sciforum. Beware that entering into financial agreements with non-endorsed companies can have costly consequences.
Insurance
The organizers do not accept liability for personal accidents, losses, or damage to private property incurred as a result of participation in ncRNA 2024. Delegates are advised to arrange appropriate insurance to cover travel, cancellation costs, medical expenses, and theft or damage of belongings.
MDPI Conference Admissions Policy
- All registered conference delegates are asked to always wear their badges throughout the conference.
- Conference sessions, the catering area, and the poster area are solely restricted to badge holders. Any person attending these areas without a badge will be asked to leave the premises.
- Badge holders must not allow their badges to be worn by anyone else. Any failure to do so is likely to lead to the badge holder and the person wearing the badge being removed from the premises.
- Press badges are restricted to publishers, editors, journalists, broadcasters, and web bloggers associated with the conference subject area. Members of the press may be asked to produce accreditation in the form of a photocopy of a recognized press or media card, a business card, a letter from the editor, or an official web address linking to a press release in order to verify their position.
- Photographs and videos may be taken during the conference. Anyone attending the conference consents to such photography and filming without compensation and confirms that the organizers shall be entitled to use such photographs and videos, which may include photographs and videos of visitors, for the purpose of marketing the conference in the future and for exploitation in any and all media, without liability.
Payment methods
Wire transfer, Credit card
Currencies accepted by this event
Swiss francs (CHF) , Euros (EUR) , US dollars (USD) , Pounds sterling (GBP) , Japanese yen (JPY) , Canadian dollars (CAD) and Singapore dollars (SGD)
Instructions for Authors
- Create an account on Sciforum if you do not have one and then click on ‘New Submission’ in the upper-right corner of the window; or, click on ‘Submit Abstract’ at the top of this webpage.
- Choose a session that is best suited for your research.
- Submit an abstract in English—the word limits are a minimum of 150 words and a maximum of 300 words.
- The deadline to submit your abstract is 14 May 2024. You will be notified about its acceptance by 11 June 2024.
- Upon submission, you can select if you wish to be considered for oral or poster presentation (or both). Following assessment by the Chairs and Scientific Committee, you will be notified by 11 June 2024 whether your contribution has been accepted for oral or poster presentation.
- Please note that, in order to finalize the scientific program in due time, at least one registration by any of the authors, denoted as the Covering Author, is required to cover the presentation and publication of any accepted abstract. The Covering Author registration deadline is 31 July 2024. Your abstract will be withdrawn if your registration is not complete by this date.
Each presenter will be provided with a vertical poster board. Maximum poster size is limited to A0: 84 x 120 cm / 33 x 47 in (width x height) in the vertical orientation (portrait). Please print your poster prior to the conference. A plan for the poster session will be circulated later.
All accepted abstracts will be available online in Open Access form on Sciforum.net during and after the conference.
Venue, Travel and Accommodation
Venue
Basel
Sitting on the banks of the Rhine River, Basel's history can be traced back to Roman times, making it a city steeped in tradition. The medieval period witnessed Basel's rise as a significant cultural and economic hub in Central Europe. The Old Town, with its cobbled streets and ancient buildings, showcases the city's grandeur from the 13th to the 15th centuries.
The 20th century witnessed transformative urban development across Basel, with a notable landmark being the Kleinbasel district. This area features striking architectural gems that reflect Basel's unique blend of tradition and modernity. Notably, the renowned Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron contributed to the city's contemporary skyline.
In 2008, Basel gained international recognition as a hub for contemporary art and culture with the inauguration of the Fondation Beyeler. This museum, designed by Renzo Piano, encapsulates Basel's commitment to both preserving its rich heritage and embracing contemporary artistic expressions.
Basel is a haven for art enthusiasts, boasting world-class museums like the Kunstmuseum and the Vitra Design Museum. The city offers a delightful array of open-air markets, dining establishments, boutiques, and historical churches. It is remarkably pedestrian-friendly, and a well-structured tram system efficiently connects residents and visitors to the city's many attractions.
For a complete overview, see wikitravel.org or visit www.basel.com.
Conference Venue – The memox Basel Main Station
The memox Basel Main Station venue is located right next to Basel SBB station, within the Peter Merian Haus. Thanks to its central location, the building is optimally connected to the public transport network and is thus easily accessible by bus, tram, and train. Huge window fronts and an impressive atrium provide plenty of natural daylight in the venue and create a great atmosphere.
How to get there
Address: Peter-Merian-Strasse 80, 4052 Basel
- 100m to Basel SBB train station
- 250m to the tram stop "Peter Merian"
- 200m to the "Post Parking Basel"
- 200m to "Parcandi Parking Basel"
Travel
One important benefit to keep in mind when traveling to Basel is that a hotel booking gives you access to free public transit, among a range of other bonuses. Your hotel will give you a BaselCard when you check in, allowing you to access these benefits. Keep a printout of your hotel booking confirmation with you, because free transit applies even to your trip between the airport and your hotel!
By train:
- Trains from France arrive at the French regional train platforms in Basel SBB station.
- Guests traveling from Germany can choose whether to get off at Basel SBB station or at Badischer Bahnhof near the Messe Basel exhibition center. From Badischer Bahnhof, guests can take the number 1 Dreirosenbrücke tram line departing every 15 minutes, which stops directly in front of Basel SBB station.
Basel SBB station is Europe’s largest border station.
By plane:
- By bus: Bus number 50 connects the Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg airport with the city center seven days a week for EUR 4.70. It stops in front of Basel SBB station after a short 15-minute ride. From Basel SBB station, guests can walk along Centralbahnstrasse to reach Peter-Merian-Strasse 80, the conference venue, minutes away.
- By taxi: Taxis are available 24/7 right outside the terminal building and can take you to the city center within minutes for about EUR 45.
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BY CAR
Anyone arriving in Basel by car will find numerous parking options. You can find more information here.
Accommodation
We want your stay in Basel during the conference to be as comfortable as possible. With that in mind, we have agreed on a discount with several hotels to make your choice of accommodations easier. Please book your accommodation online and contact the hotels directly with any issues or requests related to accommodation bookings.
We are delighted to announce that the following hotels will offer a discounted price for all ncRNA 2024 attendees:
| Hotel | Description |
How to book |
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Be our guest in Basel! |
Click here to book a room with preferential rates. | |
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Modern comfort in a historic building. The award-winning Basel Youth Hostel brings innovative architectural design to the romantic St. Alban stream. |
To book a room, click here and use the promo code "MDPI" to access a discount. |
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Urban, unique and inspiring. This is the 4-star Design & Lifestyle Hotel Nomad in the middle of Grossbasel. It’s here where locals and guests from around the world find their temporary home. Modern architecture, in combination with a homely design, characterizes the hotel with a unique charm: from the gym with sauna to the Eatery and Bar, right up to the Penthouse Suite. The heart of the Nomad is the lively Eatery. Here the food tells the stories. Stories of distant lands and hidden, adventurous places. Dishes – citations from places, which the urban nomad enjoyed on his travels – bring the guests of the Eatery together as they linger at the bar late into the night. |
Click here to make your booking and use the code "MDPI24" to access preferential rates for your stay. |
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Book your room at a great price in the new ibis Styles Basel City hotel. At ibis Styles, WIFI and breakfast are always included. The modern, bright, air-conditioned Design Rooms, with fresh colors, offer a flat-screen TV and wonderfully comfortable Sweet Bed by ibis Styles beds. The hotel's central location, only a few minutes' walk from the Basel SBB train station, makes it easy to see the sights. |
Click here to make your booking and use the promo code "KONF" under "Special Rates" to access the event rates for your stay. |
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Book your room at the new ibis budget Basel City at an affordable price. The modern, bright rooms have AC, free Wi-Fi, flat-screen TVs, and comfortable Sweet Bed by ibis budget beds. Thanks to its central location, a few minutes away from the SBB train station, many attractions, such as St. Jakob Park and Messe Basel, can be reached on foot or by public transport. Look forward to a great stay at a fantastic price! |
Click here to make your booking and use the promo code "KONF" under "Special Rates" to access the event rates for your stay. |
Conference Dinner
Tuesday, 08 October 2024, 7:00 pm CET
60 CHF (per person)
We are pleased to invite you to join us at our Conference Dinner at Markthalle, a delightful indoor food market with stalls serving cuisines from around the world. It is conveniently located at the other end of Basel SBB station, and is a quick ten-minute walk from the event venue.
Hungry for Variety? How About an All-You-Can-Eat Dinner?
Flexibility will be the mainstay of our event there, as you will be able to select meals from any of the stalls and cuisines on offer, along with drinks of your choice from the HausBAR. A casual dinner with friends new and old under the twinkling Markthalle dome is sure to make it an evening to remember.
Reserve your Seat Now
The dinner is for an additional fee of 60 CHF, which can be added to your registration during the registration process. Simply select the dinner as a registration extra while you fill out your registration page.
You are welcome to bring any accompanying persons by booking their seats. Please note that registrations onsite will not be possible.
"Under the unique historic dome of the Markthalle Basel, a large food market with 25 restaurants and 6 bars has been pulsating for 10 years. Public and private events, as well as numerous markets, complement and enchant the place anew every day."
Visa Information
Please note that you must apply for your own visa application. MDPI is not responsible for any visa applications. However, MDPI can provide a Visa Support Letter. To be eligible for such a document, the criteria below must be fulfilled.
Visa Support Letter
- Applicants must have paid for registration and submitted an abstract in order to get a letter of support.
- Applicants must provide us with a scan of their valid, in-date passport that contains a photo of them.
- Applicants must provide us with a letter of support from their institution to confirm that they support the delegate attending the meeting.
- This must be carried out in good time before the meeting; "last minute" requests will not be processed.
More useful information on visa application
Event Awards
In order to recognize the works presented during the conference in the format of posters and presentations, two awards will be offered to our conference participants. The Awardees will be announced during the Award Ceremony on the last day of the conference.
The award winners will be selected by the Selection Committee after evaluation of all selected talks and posters presented at the conference.
We will be offering the following two awards to our conference attendees:
The Awards
Number of Awards Available: 1
Prize: CHF 500
Number of Awards Available: 1
Prize: CHF 400
Sponsors and Partners
We invite you and your company to participate in and sponsor ncRNA 2024! Find all information on sponsorship opportunities in our Sponsorship Agenda. If you have any questions or wish to discuss options further, please do not hesitate to contact the Conference Secretariat. We thank you for your consideration!
Organizers
Partnering Societies
Media Partners
