Systems Chemistry II: Evolution and Systems October 17, 2009

The conference will focus on the unifying organisational and dynamic principles that link systems chemistry with other fields of science. Presentations will go beyond chemistry, but will also allow participants to learn new ways of thinking about chemistry.

Systems theory has laid the conceptual foundations of contemporary approaches. Systems biology combines these approaches with theoretical advances and bioinformatics databases. Systems chemistry is a new field dealing with the analysis and synthesis of autocatalytic chemical systems. The roots of biological evolvability also lie within systems chemistry.

Darwin’s now celebrated theory of evolution by natural selection was universally accepted thanks to the modern synthesis, which unites Darwinian reasoning with classical and population genetics. We are now experiencing a phase of extended evolutionary synthesis deepening and expanding the modern synthesis. Evolution and development (evo-devo) and the theory of niche construction contribute to this advance. Systems chemistry, evolutionary economics, possible evolutionary approaches to brain dynamics and some conceptualisations of linguistic phenomena apply the idea of evolutionary units and the Darwinian dynamics into areas where such thinking is novel and surprising.

The meeting will bring together experts from all these fields in order to approach the power of evolutionary thought in many of its ramifications.

Invited Speakers

• Robert Aunger, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK


• Ference Darvas, Thalesnano, HU


• Albert Eschenmoser, ETH Zurich, CH


• Chrisantha Fernando, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK


• Herb Gintis, Santa Fe Institute, US


• George Kampis, Eötvös University Budapest, HU


• Frigyes Károlyházy, Eötvös University Budapest, HU


• Stuart Kauffman, University of Calgary, CA


• Doron Lancet, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, IL


• Niles Lehman, Portland State University, US


• Pier Luigi Luisi, University of Rome, IT


• William Martin, Heinrich-Heine University Düsseldorf, DE


• John Odling-Smee, University of Oxford, UK


• Balázs Papp, Biological Research Center Szeged, HU


• Sergei Rodin, The Beckman Research Institute, City of Hope, US


• Mauro Santos, Autonomous University Barcelona, ES


• Peter Schuster, University of Vienna, AT


• Luc Steels, SONY Lab Paris, FR


• Dan Tawfik, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, IL


• Günter von Kiedrowski, Ruhr University Bochum, DE


• Günter Wagner, Yale University, US


• Michael Yarus, University of Colorado at Boulder, US

Conference information provided by konferenciakalauz.hu

Official Website: http://www.esf.org/index.php?id=5938