On behalf of the organizing committee, we would like to take this opportunity to invite you to attend the 5th International Conference on Frontiers in Biomedical and Environmental Health (icBEST-2014) in conjunction with the 5th International Symposium on DNA Damage Response & Human Disease (isDDRHD-2014), which will be held in Beijing, China on October 16-19th, 2014. The icBEST series is a biennial international conference focusing on genome stability & cancer. It was initiated by several oversea Chinese scientists in 1998. The first official meeting was inaugurated in Wuhan in 2006 followed by meetings in Hangzhou in 2008, Beijing in 2010, and Guangzhou in 2012. The isDDRHD series was initiated by Drs. Zhao-Qi Wang and Xingzhi Xu as the Sino-German DNA Repair meeting in 2010 and evolved into an annual international symposium ever since. The theme of this joint conference in 2014 is DNA Damage Response & Cancer.The topics willinclude, but not limited to, DNA damage signaling and DNA repair, replication stress, post-translational modifications in DNA damage response, chromatin dynamics in DNA damage response, genome stability, novel cellular response to DNA damage, novel anti-cancer lead compounds targeting DNA damage response pathways, and DNA damage response pathways as therapeutic targets. The symposium will highlight recent progresses in these selected fields through participation of many international leaders in these fields. In addition, an editorial forum with editors from top journals will be arranged. Our aim is to provide an interactive forum to showcase the excellent science being undertaken in the above fields. The scientific sessions are highly topical with an excellent program including keynote lectures, plenary presentations, selected talks from submitted asbtracts, and poster presentations. Beyond science, to experience the cultural heritage of China in person through Beijing, the capital of China for centuries with its long traditional history and the Olympic city in 2008, would be too wonderful for words. In addition, a pre-conference satellite meeting will be hosted by Dr. Guangming Zhou, CAS Institute of Modern Physics at Lanzhou on Oct. 13-15th, 2014, and a post-conference satellite meeting will be oeganized by Dr. Zhixiong (Jim) Xiao, Sichuan University at Chengdu on Oct. 20-22nd, 2014. We encourage you to join us at this exciting symposium and we look forward to welcoming you in October 2014.