Physics of Biomolecular Condensates Through the Lens of Phase Transitions

Biomolecular condensates provide an important example of how living cells use collective physical behavior to organize matter. Although they share many features with conventional phases of matter, cellular condensates are multicomponent, chemically regulated, mechanically coupled, and often maintained far from equilibrium. Advances in imaging, perturbation, and biochemical measurements are now making it possible to quantitatively probe condensates in their native cellular contexts, while new theoretical and computational approaches are beginning to enable predictive descriptions of these multicomponent and active systems. This workshop will bring together theorists and experimentalists to explore the resulting frontier questions: how molecular interactions determine condensate formation and composition, how cellular activity reshapes condensate dynamics and organization, how condensate physics impacts biological function, and which measurements provide the most stringent tests of physical models. The goal is to uncover physical principles and mechanisms that link molecular interactions to cellular organization and function.