Dear Colleague:

We are excited to announce a cutting-edge research conference entitled New Frontiers in Pediatric Traumatic Brain Injury, to be held in San Diego, November 8-10, 2007. Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a leading cause of death and disability in youth, and therefore represents a major societal problem. Further advances in our understanding and clinical management of pediatric TBI will require collaborative research that cuts across multiple levels and disciplinary perspectives. The time is ripe for an interdisciplinary conference that promotes integrative and translational research efforts.

To this end, the conference’s primary goal is to promote multi-level, integrative, and translational research, and to encourage both new and established investigators to undertake research consistent with this goal. By bringing together experts from multiple disciplines, facilitating their interaction, and encouraging collaborative linkages among established and new investigators, the conference will promote research that cuts across disciplines and domains.

The conference will last 2 ½ days, and will include invited speakers, panel discussions, and poster symposia sessions. The invited speakers represent multiple disciplines and will discuss a range of topics that reflect interdisciplinary research methods and expertise. Panel discussions will focus on issues of particular relevance across the field.

We encourage all conference attendees to submit an abstract describing their own research. Poster sessions will take place during conference lunches and also during a reception on the evening of the first day. Two poster symposia sessions will provide graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and junior investigators with an opportunity to showcase their research and to interact with more senior investigators. A limited number of travel scholarships will be awarded to those with the highest-rated abstracts. All abstracts accepted for the meeting will be published later this year in an issue of the international pediatric rehabilitation journal, Developmental Neurorehabilitation.

We look forward to an exciting and enjoyable conference, and hope that you will attend.

Sincerely,

Keith O. Yeates, PhD
Vicki Anderson, PhD
Conference Organizers

Abstracts accepted for the meeting will be published late this year in an issue of the International Pediatric Rehabilitation Journal, Developmental Neurorehabilitation.