As the year draws to a close, I write this column uncertain if I will be allowed to travel to San Francisco, but heartened that my airline tickets purchased in September finally came through on Christmas Day. This year has been an incredibly busy and productive year for the Biophysical Society (BPS), despite the continuing challenges arising from the pandemic.
The year began with the delivery of a virtual Annual Meeting and assessing the feasibility of future in-person events, the impact on membership, and how the Society will function during the pandemic. A special thank you to our 2021 Program Chairs, Patricia Bassereau and Betrand Garcia-Moreno, and Elizabeth Komives and Arthur Palmer for their extraordinary efforts for the 2022 Annual Meeting.
BPS2021 was our first fully virtual Annual Meeting, with more than 3,600 attendees, 1,400 posters, and 400 prerecorded presentations for the Subgroup and Platform sessions. The five-day event included an online exhibit hall, Student Research Achievement Awards, the Undergraduate Poster Awards Competition, career-level and speed networking sessions, a Meet the Editors event, BPS Awards and Fellows presentations, the BPS Lecture, and the President’s Symposium on Building an Inclusive Biophysical Society. Workshops were held in March and had higher attendee numbers than our face-to-face meetings do. Feedback was generally very positive, and the experience that was delivered in the virtual format was appreciated, although a survey indicated that respondents prefer in-person events.
At Spring Council, we noted the impact on BPS finances, the drop in membership renewals, and our dependance on revenue from the Biophysical Journal (BJ). I urge members to submit papers to BJ, which is the flagship journal for biophysics, as well as the Biophysical Reports, which launched last year and successfully published its first two issues online in September and December.
By Fall Council, we were relieved that our estimated deficit for 2021 was significantly better than budgeted. However, finances remain a concern in 2022 with another deficit budget as we continue to work to minimize and manage the financial loss.
The drop in membership renewals is correlated to attendance at the Annual Meeting. The value of membership has been reframed as extending throughout the year. We held committee meetings outside of Annual Meeting week as well numerous programs, including virtual new member welcome events, additional career panels, and professional development sessions.
The 2021 edition of Biophysics Week, the annual event to celebrate and raise awareness of the field, included a Biophysics 101 session, another on Funding Opportunities for Faculty at Primarily Undergraduate Institutions, webinars on both National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation grants, career networking sessions, and a Fireside Chat with BPS journal editors. We also hosted a webinar titled “Building a Welcoming & Inclusive Research Community” as well as a screening of Picture a Scientist, a documentary about gender-based harassment experienced by women in STEM fields. In addition, we launched a series of webinars with The Biophysicist and the Education Committee related to teaching biophysics. The Membership Committee hosted a dozen virtual networking events throughout the year with topics such as biophysical methods used in clinical medicine, biomolecular modeling in machine learning, and the impacts of the pandemic on young Latin American biophysicists. The virtual symposium “Biophysical Society Celebrates 50 Years of the Protein Data Bank (PBD50)” in October reached more than 730 attendees. This programming aimed to provide value and opportunities for member engagement throughout the year.
The President’s Task Force on Policy was established to address misconduct of BPS Members. Since the BPS bylaws did not support the desired policies, the necessary bylaw changes were put to a vote and obtained member approval. The Task Force developed Ethics Guidelines and a BPS Awards and Fellows Revocation Policy, which were both approved at Fall Council and announced in the December issue of the BPS Bulletin.
A Subgroup Task Force evaluated the feasibility of adding more Subgroups and proposals for sustainable programming. The outcomes included recommendations on capping Subgroups, a report card mechanism for evaluation, and an incubator program prior to new Subgroup applications. Fall Council approved the Subgroup Task Force recommendations, which are discussed in the January issue of BPS Bulletin.
Planning for the 2022 Annual Meeting during the ongoing pandemic included a new set of challenges. The initial decision was to prioritize the in-person meeting and record a subset of content to offer an on-demand option after the meeting. In early September we expanded the online content to include an ePoster gallery to allow poster presenters unable to travel to the meeting to share their work with colleagues. We also will provide vaccination verification services for on-site attendees, although the Omicron variant is now a concern, which means dealing with increased anxieties, changes of travel plans for some attendees, etc. BPS2022 is an entirely distinct set of more complicated challenges compared with the virtual Annual Meeting in 2021. We are fortunate to have excellent staff who are managing these additional challenges.
Finally, our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) underpins most of what we do and has been a focus throughout the year. We continually review our efforts to support DEI in the work of our committees, in BPS awards and nominations, and in our program events. Strategic planning will be undertaken in 2022 to formally review and update the BPS Strategic Plan. As I hand over the gavel to incoming president, Gail Robertson, plans are underway for a post‐pandemic vision for the Society.
This year was not what I anticipated when I was president-elect, but was still a very productive year for the Society and I am proud to have served as BPS president. The accomplishments above were possible due to the support, collaboration, and efforts of the excellent BPS staff and volunteers. I remain inspired and motivated by the hard work and dedication that so many individuals expend on behalf of the Society and look forward to seeing many of you at BPS2022.
—Frances Separovic, President