Charles Gerday – författare

Most scientists in the middle of the twentieth century would probably not have believed that life was possible at extreme values of environmental factors, such as pH values close to 0 (e. g. sulfurous environments) or to 14 (e. g. soda lakes), sali- ties of 6 M NaCl (e. g. Dead Sea), hydrostatic pressures approaching 0. 1 MPa (deep sea) and temperatures exceeding 100°C (thermal vents or hot springs) or as low as –20°C (e. g. polar regions). Of the current studies on extremophiles, approximately 30,000 articles by the year 2007, almost two-thirds have been performed on org- isms adapted to outstanding temperatures, but much more attention has been paid to thermophiles than to psychrophiles. However, over the past 10 years, scientific publications on cold-adapted microorganisms have increased by a factor of ten. If one considers the extent of cold habitats, psychrophiles, i. e. cold-loving organisms, should largely lead in this comparison with thermophiles because a great proportion of the Earth’s biosphere never reaches temperatures above 5°C. Nearly three-quarters of the Earth is covered by oceans whose deep water masses, irrespective of latitude, are constantly between 2 and 4°C. The large continent of Antarctica also provides a permanently cold terrestrial environment as well as an aquatic niche in the surrounding ice that melts during the summer. Other examples of cold habitats are permafrost soils, high alpine soils, cold deserts, cold caves, marine sediments, snow, glacier and sea ice.

The idea of Professors Bolis and Gilles to gather together for a 3 days'' meeting in the splendid environment of Crans-Montana in Switzerland a limited number of people around the subject of calcium and calcium bind­ ing proteins seemed at first particularly attractive, and when they asked me to take charge of the scientific organization of the symposium, I accepted with enthusiasm. It rapidly became clear that the major problem would be the selection of the topics, since it was impossible to cover completely and in depth such a broad and dynamic area of research. In our view, one imperative was to associate as intimately as possible the structural and the functional aspects of the areas covered. Apart from one whole day focused on the fascinating roles played by calmodulin in cellular activities, the other sessions were devoted to calmodulin-related calcium binding proteins in muscle and non­ muscle tissues and to some selected biological systems such as mitochondria, secretory cells or sarcoplasmic reticulum in which calcium also plays a crucial role. The presentations were made by leading investigators in their field. Some of them do not, however, appear in the present volume, for which there are two reasons: first, some of the contributions were somewhat outside the scope of the book; second, three speakers, for valid reasons, simply found no opportunity to write a manuscript in the allotted time.

The idea of Professors Bolis and Gilles to gather together for a 3 days' meeting in the splendid environment of Crans-Montana in Switzerland a limited number of people around the subject of calcium and calcium bind­ ing proteins seemed at first particularly attractive, and when they asked me to take charge of the scientific organization of the symposium, I accepted with enthusiasm. It rapidly became clear that the major problem would be the selection of the topics, since it was impossible to cover completely and in depth such a broad and dynamic area of research. In our view, one imperative was to associate as intimately as possible the structural and the functional aspects of the areas covered. Apart from one whole day focused on the fascinating roles played by calmodulin in cellular activities, the other sessions were devoted to calmodulin-related calcium binding proteins in muscle and non­ muscle tissues and to some selected biological systems such as mitochondria, secretory cells or sarcoplasmic reticulum in which calcium also plays a crucial role. The presentations were made by leading investigators in their field. Some of them do not, however, appear in the present volume, for which there are two reasons: first, some of the contributions were somewhat outside the scope of the book; second, three speakers, for valid reasons, simply found no opportunity to write a manuscript in the allotted time.