Young Scientists SIG Report June 2008 

YSSIG social events:

YSSIG mixer in the Sunsphere. It was a very well attended event with buffet dinner and open bar. This year YSSIG did not have a sponsor, since QIAGEN decided not to continue with their sponsorship due to lack of traffic in their booth is SLC. 

YSSIG mentor mentee dinner. This will be held on Tuesday night at Calhoun’s after the meeting with the Council, so details are not available now. The format will be the same as before, but Rayonix’s party is at the same time…  

YSSIG has 3 sessions this year:

Professional Directions, a panel discussion. (Co-sponsored with GIG SIG) This session was chaired by Robert Huether and it was very well attended by ~40 people that stayed throughout. Those on the panel (William Duax, Charles Campana, Jane Richardson, Jeanette Krause, David Rose) were very enthusiastic and helpful to the audience. The duration of the session was from 1:30PM to 3 unlike what was printed in the program (5pm). This format was very engaging and informative, so YSSIG may stay with it for future sessions.  

Etter Early Career Award Symposium: Anna S. Gardberg chairs this session. As last year, YSSIG could waive the registration for all of the presenters in this session. The YSSIG is very grateful to ACA for allowing this, since funding is still scarce for students. The presenters are a mixture of small-molecular and macromolecular crystallographers. The session will be held after the meeting with the ACA Council.  

Computational crystallography-Nuts and Bolts: (Co-Sponsored with BIOMAC SIG) Peter Horanyi and Ed Collins co-chair this session. This is the first year that the YSSIG has done this session. This session focuses on all of data collection and processing including refinement. This should be a well attended session. 

The YSSIG business meeting will be on Wednesday.

The same sessions as this year will be proposed. Etter Award Symposium, Professional Directions or similar as in the past.  BIOMAC SIG has asked YSSIG to co-sponsor a session on data refinement this session will be brought in front of the group. Peter Horanyi and Ed Collins will chair this session in 2009.

YSSIG has had difficult times securing session chairs, since students and postdocs do not know about their future funding. Getting some financial support for one or two session chairs would help in this.

YSSIG has lost the support of QIAGEN, that has been present for the past 4 years, but RIGAKU has shown interest in sponsoring the SIG’s social events in the future.

Elections will take place for both chair elect and secretary. 

Peter Horanyi

Young Scientists SIG Chair