2014-ANZSCDB-Summer-newsletter

President's report
Denton (SA), Megan Wilson
(NZ) and Evan Ingley (WA).
In Victoria both state reps
(Jan Kaslin and Louise
Cheng) will continue for
another year as both were
elected last year following the
early retirement of a previous
rep. Our ACT rep Kristen
Barratt agreed to stay on for
another term and was reelected
at the AGM. I would
also like to welcome our new
state reps and thank them
for volunteering their time. I
look forward to working with
you all in this last year of my
Presidency. Incoming state
reps are: Annette Shewan
(Qld), Kazu Kikuchi (NSW),
Michael Lardelli (SA) Fiona
Pixley (WA) and Elizabeth
Duncan (NZ).
I would like to give a
particular vote of thanks to
our outgoing NZ rep Megan
Wilson who established our
facebook page and twitter
account. I personally find
the ANZSCDB facebook
page a great source of
information and I encourage
all members to like us on
facebook and follow us on
twitter. Fortunately Megan
has agreed to continue to
maintain these valuable
resources.
ComBio
ComBio2014 was held in
Canberra from September 28
to October 2. The meeting
was extremely successful
and those who attended were
impressed with the quality of
the science and interactions
both scientifically and
socially. The conference chair
was Edna Hardeman, and the
success of the meeting was a
credit to her, the Programme
Chair Jacquie Mathews, the
rest of the committee and
President’s Medal
of course Sally Jay and her
team for superb organisation.
The cell and developmental
biology streams were
organised by ANZSCDB
representatives Kat Gaus and
Richard Harvey respectively
and we thank them for their
efforts in making Combio a
great showcase for cell and
developmental biology both
nationally and internationally.
Plenary speakers included
Nobel Laureate John Gurdon,
Jennifer Lippincott-Schwartz,
Marino Zerial, Aki Kusumi,
Kateri-Moore and Tom Rando.
You can read more about the
meeting in Edna’s report later
in the newsletter.
This year the society also ran
a session entitled “Making
cell and developmental
biology attractive in the
current funding climate”. This
session was designed to give
members the opportunity
to discuss strategies we can
use to capitalise on funding
opportunities in what were
widely acknowledged as
trying times for research
funding. The panel consisted
of Melissa Little (UQ), Sharad
Kumar (Centre for Cancer
Biology, SA), Peter Gunning
(UNSW) and Richard Harvey
(VCCRI, NSW) who all
did a great job of keeping
the discussion on track
and sharing their insights
from various perspectives.
While there was much
inevitable discussion about
the process of allocating
grant funding, it was
acknowledged that we should
all be considering other
avenues for research funding
outside the more traditional
government funded granting
options. These include
commercialisation and
philanthropy, and there was
a useful discussion around
how we could tap into
those options. While there
were no magic solutions it
was a useful way to begin
discussions and get people
thinking about alternative
forms of funding. Thanks
to our panel members and
everyone who came along
and participated in the
discussion.
Another regular feature of
ComBio is the ANZSCDB
Dinner, which offers our
members the chance to
socialise and network in an
informal environment. This
is also an opportunity to get
to know our international
speakers and to thank them
for their contributions to
the meeting. This year’s
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