Recent advances in computational methodologies and artificial intelligence have now enabled us to investigate entangled secrets of life that had long remained unsolvable， including one of the most fundamental properties - emergence. Emergence is the integrative property of an entity that does not appear in its components or in their simple summation. Biosystems consist of multiple biological scales， from molecular to whole body levels， and often exhibit unique properties that are only manifested at higher scales established by self-assembly or self-organization of components from lower scales. Well-known examples of emergent phenomena include tissue formation by multiple cells differentiated from a single stem-cell type and higher-order organ networking to integrate different tissues. Thus， emergence is a common key concept for addressing mechanisms of life， across different life science fields. This symposium will cover the latest research advances of emergent phenomena with a focus on computational and engineering approaches， including cutting-edge technologies such as artificial intelligence， to understand emergent properties in biology.

The second RIKEN BDR Symposium targets a wide range of relevant topics， including (i) Origin of life， (ii) Protein/RNA self-assembly， (iii) Intracellular organelle formation， (iv) Cell assembly and organ formation， and (v) Brain function and its underlying principle. We hope that this symposium will be a great opportunity for all participants to stimulate cross-disciplinary interactions and discussions that open new avenues of life science studies.

We encourage the submission of abstracts for the poster session from many scientists to increase opportunities for lively and informative exchange of views. A small number of poster abstracts will be selected for oral presentations. A limited number of travel fellowships for graduate students and post-docs traveling to Japan will also be available.