Hyderabad|India|December'2009: The XXXIII AICBC 2009 and the International Workshop on Cell Cycle Regulation was inaugurated at the DST Auditorium in the University of Hyderabad (UoH) campus. The School of Life Sciences at UoH is organizing this three days programme from 10-13 December 2009. More than 600 delegates including 40 foreign scientists would be participating in the conference.

The conference would be marked by a series of Distinguished Lectures, first one being the Prof. J Das memorial lecture delivered by Prof. A Surolia, Director, National Institute of Immunology and the next lecture by Prof. Joerg Hacker, Director, Robert Koch Institute, Germany. The conference would consist of presentation of about 200 papers and presentations through posters by the delegates. Awards will be presented by the Indian Society of Cell Biology to encourage the budding scientists.

In the inaugural session, Prof. Seyed E Hasnain, Vice Chancellor, UoH extended a hearty welcome to the participants and spoke about the University and its achievements. Prof. A S Raghavendra, Dean, School of Life Sciences gave a brief of the School activities.

The presidential address was delivered by Prof. Rita Mulhelkar, President of The Indian Society of Cell Biology. In her presidential address she spoke about the functioning of the society and the ranges of research undertaken in her laboratory related to Cell Biology. The book of abstracts was released by Prof. Mulhelkar. Prof. S Dayananda, Convener of AICBC 2009 proposed the vote of thanks.