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<p class="MsoNormal">Dear Xenopus Community,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The 2017 Xenopus Resources and Emerging Technologies (XRET) meeting was held at the Marine Biology Laboratory in Woods Hole, Massachusetts (USA) on August 26-29<sup>th</sup>. Organized by Marko Horb and the NXR and sponsored by Iwaki, Aquatic
Enterprises, Aquaneering, Tecniplast, Nasco and Xenopus One, this meeting was jam-packed with exciting advances in
<i>Xenopus</i> research covering topics in: gene editing; improvements in genomes and genome-wide analytics; proteomics; image analysis; cell-free systems; reprogramming and stem cells; nervous and immune systems; various aspects of cell biology; and organogenesis.
There also were updates on the resource centers (NXR, XLRRI, EXRC and the Amphibian Research Center [(ARC/National BioResource Project (NBRP)] in Japan, the CSHL Press
<i>Xenopus</i> protocols, and the newly formed International <i>Xenopus</i> Board. During the group discussion it was decided:<o:p></o:p></p>
<ul style="margin-top:0in" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l2 level1 lfo1">To write an abbreviated “White Paper” (~2 pages) to emphasize how the emerging technologies will allow researchers to collaborate with clinicians and use
<i>Xenopus</i> to model human disease. Mustafa Khokha and John Wallingford will take the lead on writing the draft.<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l2 level1 lfo1">To put together a group of speakers on topics related to using
<i>Xenopus</i> as a human genetics disease model for the 2018 American Society of Human Genetics meeting, which will be held in San Diego (CA, USA) October 16-20<sup>th</sup>. Mustafa Khokha will take the lead in organizing this; please contact him (mustafa.khokha@yale.edu)
if you wish to present as part of this group.<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l2 level1 lfo1">To organize a small
<i>Xenopus</i> meeting to be part of The Allied Genetics Conference (cleverly abbreviated TAGC) to be organized by the Genetics Society of America (GSA) in 2020. This will not substitute for the 2020 International Xenopus Conference. Sally Moody, Soeren Lienkamp
and Karen Liu will organize this; please contact Sally (samoody@gwu.edu) if you wish to participate.<o:p></o:p></li></ul>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Important dates and topics that were announced at the meeting include:<o:p></o:p></p>
<ul style="margin-top:0in" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo2">The 2018 International
<i>Xenopus</i> Conference will be held at the University of Washington, in Seattle (WA, USA) August 12-16. The organizers are Richard Harland and Rebecca Heald. Look for more information soon to be posted on XenBase (<a href="http://www.xenbase.org/entry/">http://www.xenbase.org/entry/</a>)
and the GSA website (http://conferences.genetics-gsa.org/xenopus/index).<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo2">Rachel Miller (Univ. Texas, Houston) and Greg Weber (Rutgers Univ.) received IXB travel awards to support their participation in the XRET meeting.<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo2">Leonid Peshkin and Marc Kirschner are organizing a Jamboree to annotate the whole embryo proteomics and transcriptomics data and the single cell transcriptomics data that the group has generated.
(pesha@hms.harvard.edu)<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo2">The EXRC grant renewals are coming up soon. Matt Guille would like to receive letters of support before December. (matthew.guille@port.ac.uk)<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo2">The upgraded versions of the
<i>Xenopus</i> genomes that are Xenbase have been submitted to NCBI, but several web resources, such as ENSEMBL and UCSC, have not imported them. Aaron Zorn would like community support to contact specific sites to get them to upgrade ASAP to make the genomic
information readily available to the broader scientific community. (<a href="mailto:aaron.zorn@cchmc.org">aaron.zorn@cchmc.org</a>)<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo2">A Company of Biologists workshop on “Developmental Biology of Birth Defects” has been proposed by Karen Liu, Mustafa Khokha and John Wallingford. If the proposal is accepted,
<i>Xenopus</i> research needs to be included; they will let the community know via Xine (http://www.mbl.edu/xenopus/xine).<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo2">The NIH grant supporting the “<i>Xenopus laevis</i> Research Resource for Immunobiology (XLRRI)” is up for renewal (https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/microbiology-immunology/xenopus-laevis.aspx).
Jacques Robert would appreciate community support for this important resource (<a href="mailto:jacques_robert@urmc.rochester.edu">jacques_robert@urmc.rochester.edu</a>).<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo2">Grants supporting the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory “Cell and Developmental Biology of
<i>Xenopus</i>” course (<a href="https://meetings.cshl.edu/courses.aspx?course=C-XENO&year=17">https://meetings.cshl.edu/courses.aspx?course=C-XENO&year=17</a>) are up for renewal. Mustafa Khokha and Karen Liu are working with CSHL staff to out these together.
Please have your students, postdocs and colleagues apply to take the 2018 course.<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo2">Reminder: please cite the NXR, Xenbase the XLRRI (and other resources) in your publications!! These citations are very important for future grant renewals. Please cite references and the
RRID numbers, which can be found at: (<a href="http://www.xenbase.org/other/static/citingXenbase.jsp">http://www.xenbase.org/other/static/citingXenbase.jsp</a>)<o:p></o:p></li></ul>
<p class="MsoNormal">(<a href="http://www.mbl.edu/xenopus/citing-the-nxr)">http://www.mbl.edu/xenopus/citing-the-nxr)</a><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">(<a href="https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/microbiology-immunology/xenopus-laevis.aspx)">https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/microbiology-immunology/xenopus-laevis.aspx)</a>; cite Xenopus laevis Research Resource for Immunobiology Resource in
your acknowledgments.<o:p></o:p></p>
<ul style="margin-top:0in" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list:l1 level1 lfo3">Reminder: If you are not on the Xine listserve, please sign up at (<a href="http://www.mbl.edu/xenopus/xine">http://www.mbl.edu/xenopus/xine</a>) so you receive community updates.<o:p></o:p></li><li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list:l1 level1 lfo3">A very successful European Amphibian Club meeting, which included many Xenopus labs, was held this summer in France. The next EAC meeting will be in 2019 in Germany. Please contact Soeren Lienkamp for details
(soeren.lienkamp@uniklinik-freiburg.de).<o:p></o:p></li></ul>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Please thank Sally Moody for providing us with this summary.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Look forward to seeing everyone next year at the University of Washington<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Marko<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="FR"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
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