IMPORTANT DATES
March 24 - 28, 2025: Registration Window
May 16, 2025: Deadline for abstract submission
May 23, 2025: Those selected to give talks will be notified.
May 30, 2025: Deadline to upload posters to be printed by HHMI
June 6 - 9: Attend SEA Faculty Meeting

WHO SHOULD REGISTER?
HHMI HQ has a meeting capacity of 175 persons. Given the size of our community, this means that we invite 1 faculty member to represent each SEA institution. An overview of the agenda is provided below to help you decide who best to represent your institution. You may nominate a second faculty member to attend, in-person, in particular for schools offering both the PHAGES and GENES projects. An invitation will be extended to the second person based on space availability.

HOW TO REGISTER
A registration link was sent by email to all SEA faculty on March 24th. HHMI Travel Services will use this registration information to contact participants and begin arranging travel.

WHAT IS ON THE AGENDA?
Final details of the agenda are still being developed. Here is some helpful information for now.

• Guests for the Faculty Meeting can expect to arrive at HHMI Headquarters by 3:00 PM EDT on Friday, June 6, and the Meeting will conclude by 12:00 PM EDT on Monday, June 9.
• There will be a session for faculty posters and talks. As you submit your abstracts, you will have an opportunity to indicate if you would like your abstract considered for a talk.
• The meeting will primarily feature working sessions to improve our collective work, including to improve our annotations (e.g. cluster-specific annotation work), to advance our understanding of research tools and methodologies (e.g. phage clustering, Alpha-fold, lysogeny), to write reports and manuscripts for publications (e.g. genome announcements, GENES reports, Cluster Reports), and to engage in science pedagogy research projects. When registration opens, you will have an opportunity to suggest additional topics or sessions you would like to have included at the meeting.

WHAT WILL IT COST?
HHMI will cover the cost of travel to and from the meeting, and provide lodging and meals throughout the meeting.

SEA YOU SOON!

Below are some guidelines to help you and your students prepare for the upcoming symposium. These include guidelines for:

• Important Dates
• Registration
• Abstracts and Posters
• Talks
• Interactions
• Agenda and Symposium Homepage

IMPORTANT DATES
March 31, 2025:          Deadline to register for the Symposium.
March 31, 2025:          Deadline for abstract submission.
April 3, 2025:               Those selected to give talks will be notified.
April 17, 2025:             Deadline to upload Posters to the symposium website.
April 21, 2025:             Part.1 of the Symposium Keynote available online for viewing
April 25 – 27, 2025:     Attend the Symposium.

REGISTRATION

Who should register?
All SEA faculty, and all SEA student-researchers from the 2024 - 2025 academic year, are invited to register and attend the 2025 SEA Symposium.

How do I register?
All SEA faculty members will receive instructions and a registration link by email on March 10, 2025. You will be asked to forward a registration email to your students. Registration will close March 31, 2025.
 

ABSTRACTS & POSTERS

Who should submit abstracts and posters?
SEA Faculty are responsible for submitting all abstracts and posters.
Poster abstracts will be submitted via the seaphages.org program website (see link within your institution's homepage on seaphages.org)
Final posters will be uploaded to the symposium meeting website. Instructions for abstract and poster submissions are provided below.

How many posters should be submitted?
We encourage each section of SEA students to submit one poster that describes their SEA research from the 2024 – 2025 academic year. If your school has multiple SEA sections, PHAGES or GENES, you may choose to submit one poster for each section or research project, or you can choose to submit one poster that summarizes the work of many sections or projects.

What is the format for each poster?
Posters should be prepared as a single Powerpoint slide using the Poster resource on QUBES prepared by SEA faculty, and saved as a PDF file. During the poster session, presenters will refer to this single slide PDF when presenting.

What should I include in my abstract(s) and poster(s)?
Given that the symposium will happen during your ongoing research semester, your poster will likely feature your ongoing work-in-progress. This is a great opportunity for your students to discuss their research with other students across the country and get feedback to inform their ongoing research. As much as possible, each poster should feature discoveries in the context of what is already known for similar phages. The Cluster Reports on QUBES can be a valuable resource for this. The QUBES Poster resource also provides guidance on how to develop your poster with your students to facilitate an exchange of ideas during the symposium.

Your abstract will represent a summary of what will be included in your poster. There is a 3,000 character-limit for abstracts.

What is the format for the poster session?

The poster sessions will be live sessions hosted in ZEP, which is a virtual space designed as a yacht where participants can move around using the arrow keys on their keyboard and can connect with others via video and audio based on proximity.

In this virtual space, each submitted poster will have an assigned space, and 2 poster presenters should stand by their poster. As an attendee walks up to a poster, their video and audio will connect with the poster presenter. A link at each poster allows the attendee and presenter to both view the single poster slide at the same time. A video tutorial about the yacht and the poster session will be provided soon.

Here are some additional logistics and recommendations:

• The poster session on Saturday will be for even-numbered posters, whereas the poster session on Sunday will be for odd-numbered posters.  Poster presenters will be able to locate their poster number on the Symposium meeting site and should then plan to present at their respective poster session.
• While any individual student is unlikely to be able to visit all the posters being presented during the dedicated poster sessions, collectively your group of students may be able to. Much the same way in which a few members of a lab who attend a scientific meeting return to share the science they learned with the rest of the lab, we encourage you to consider organizing a post-symposium lab group meeting where your students can share with the group what they each learned from the various posters they attended. If you are considering implementing this, it may be worth informing students of your plans before they attend the symposium.
• Since all symposium attendees will continue to have access to the symposium meeting site for several months after the symposium is over, we encourage you to continue engaging your students with the various posters as part of their ongoing PHAGES and GENES research.

How do I submit my abstract(s)?
Once you are signed in at seaphages.org, links to add, modify, or view an abstract are provided at the top of your institution page. Abstracts should by March 31, 2025.

How do I submit my poster(s)?
Once you have submitted your abstracts, SEA staff will send instructions to you and your students the week of April 14 on how to submit your poster to the Symposium Homepage. Posters should be uploaded by April 17, 2025.

TALKS  

Yes! If you would like your abstract to be considered for a talk, you can indicate so during the abstract submission. If your abstract is selected for a talk, you will be notified by April 3, 2025.
We encourage you to submit a poster even if you are selected to give a talk, since the poster session is an additional and important opportunity for faculty and student co-authors, and other symposium attendees to interact and discuss research.

What are the formats for talks?
We have 3 types of sessions for talks:

• SEA Research Sessions: These sessions will include several back-to-back 10-minute talks (+3 minutes for Q&A). Talks will be presented live. Speakers will be invited to a practice session in the weeks prior to the meeting so that they are familiar with the technology.
• SEA Lead Scientist Session: This 45-min presentation will feature our SEA-PHAGES lead scientist, Graham Hatfull and members of the Hatfull lab.
• Keynote Session: The keynote presentation by HHMI Investigator and Professor of Microbiology at Harvard Medical School, Dr. Tom Bernhardt, will be presented in two parts.
  • Part.1 will be a pre-recorded presentation that will be made available to all attendees the week of April 21. All attendees should watch Part.1 ahead of the symposium. We encourage faculty and students to watch and discuss Part.1 together. Consider dedicating one lab meeting for this.
  • Part.2, which builds on Part.1, will be a live presentation during the symposium.
     

INTERACTIONS

How will symposium attendees be able to interact?

The entire Symposium will be hosted in ZEP, a virtual meeting platform. This means all attendees can connect with one another, via video and audio, throughout the meeting.

• Talks will be hosted in the conference rooms in ZEP, and attendees will be able to walk up to a virtual microphone to ask questions. Attendees can also use the live chat to ask questions.
• Posters will be hosted in the poster rooms in ZEP, and attendees will be engage with poster presenters by video and audio during the poster session. Posters will continue to be available for viewing outside of the dedicated poster sessions.
• For all other times, including socials, we encourage all attendees to wander the virtual spaces in ZEP built for the Symposium. You will be able to interact with one another via video and audio, and more! We encourage attendees to use this space to meet between or after sessions to discuss science, or to simply catch up with old friends and to meet and make new friends.
• To help students prepare for a virtual meeting, SEA faculty have a prepared a resource hosted on QUBES that you can download, review, and share with your students.
   

AGENDA & MEETING PAGE

A link to the Symposium homepage was sent to you when you registered. To login to the homepage, use your registration password.
Here is a direct link to the homepage: https://events.uncork-it.com/events/1

Friday, April 23
5:00 PM – 6:00 PM | Concurrent Sessions
-- A Chat with SEA Scientists (for SEA Students)
-- Faculty Meet & Greet (for SEA Faculty)

Saturday, April 24
1:00 PM – 1:45 PM |Symposium Keynote
2:15 PM – 3:10 PM |Talks by SEA Researchers
3:30 PM – 4:15 PM |Poster Session -- Even-Numbered Posters

Sunday, April 25
1:00 PM – 2:00 PM |Talks by SEA Researchers
2:30 PM – 3:30 PM |Poster Session -- Odd-Numbered Posters
4:00 PM – 5:10 PM |Talk by SEA-PHAGES Lead Scientist

As a result of our Genome Announcement Workflow, the journal microPublication Biology will now have the capacity to publish one genome announcement from each SEA school, and at a reduced publication fee of $150 (discounted by HHMI from $350). If you would like to publish a genome announcement in microPublication Biology in 2025 at this discounted rate, please review the workflow steps below.

1. DOWNLOAD THE NEW TEMPLATE:
Please download the latest version of the QUBES resource for writing a microbial resource announcement. This resource is updated to reflect guidelines for microPublication Biology as well as feedback from the SEA community and reviewers.

2. PREPARE THE MANUSCRIPT WITH YOUR STUDENTS:
Writing a science manuscript is an invaluable opportunity for your students to gain experience with one of the highest forms of science communication. The QUBES recourse includes a meaningful approach to assessing this work as part of your students' educational experience.

3. ATTEMPT TO RAISE LYSOGENS
We recommend generating evidence to support claims whether your phage is lytic or temperate.  To do so, please download and review the Lysogen Datacard Template now posted on our QUBES site (see tab on Research Data). It includes the series of experiments to be performed and how the data should be presented. Several lysogens datacards have already been posted, which you can review for guidance.

4. SUBMIT GENOME ANNOTATION(S) FOR QC BY MAY 1:
It is critical that genomes that you intend to include in your manuscript be submitted for QC by May 1, so that these genomes can be prioritized and QC'ed during the summer and then submitted to GenBank before the end of the year. Since the GenBank accession number is required for a genome announcement, annotated genomes submitted for QC after the May 1 deadline may significantly impact your ability to publish your manuscript.

5. SUBMIT MANUSCRIPT FOR COMMUNITY REVIEW BY JULY 15:
Once you have written your genome announcement manuscript, you must submit your manuscript for "community review" by the SEA program. You can do so by emailing your manuscript and figures to info@seaphages.org with the subject line "Genome Announcement Manuscript for Review".

6. TIMELINE:
Two key steps in the workflow -- Annotation QC & Community Review -- are performed by a small group of SEA faculty. To ensure they are able to complete these tasks before the end of summer (i.e. before the next academic year begins), please adhere to the following timeline:

• March 1, 2025: Deadline to sign-up for the genome announcement workflow HERE.
• Through May 1, 2025: Lead students in genome annotation and manuscript preparation.
• May 1, 2025: Deadline to submit annotated genomes for QC.
• Through July 15, 2025: Review changes made to your annotation during QC (using the R2I template) and update your manuscript accordingly.
• July 15, 2025: Deadline to submit your manuscript to the SEA program for community review.
• December 31, 2025: Deadline to submit the community-reviewed manuscript to microPublication Biology

7. STATUS OF GENOME ANNOTATIONS AND MANUSCRIPT REVIEW
Below is a live spreadsheet with two sheets -- one sorted by faculty who intend to publish a genome announcement and another sorted by the cluster of phages they plan to include in the announcement. We recommend considering collaborating with one another to jointly publish on phages from a given cluster, whenever possible.