The first formal meeting of the ABRF Executive Board, consisting of the 1989 and 1990 ABRF Executive Committee members, was held in Philadelphia on March 17 and 18. The major goals were to evaluate past activities and to plan future directions of the organization. The concentrated weekend format, without distractions (the weather was lousy), was highly productive. Most previous discussions have been held via teleconferences or during scientific conferences and were necessarily less contiguous.
One high priority issue dealt with the need for increased communication with members and potential users through: this newsletter, Satellite Meetings and Workshops associated with national meetings, and use of surveys as well as timely publication of results. Another major issue was the continuing role of studies such as the Amino Acid Analysis and Sequence Subcommittee studies that have been run on an annual basis to help assess the technical capacities of core facilities through self-evaluation. Generally, the past progress in these areas was considered quite strong, and streamlining of the 1990 sample preparation and distribution should provide more time for analysis of the data prior to presentation of the results at the Protein Society Satellite meeting.
Mechanisms to streamline production of this newsletter were also addressed. The major problems were that compiling contributions, editorial review, typesetting, printing, and final distribution were spread over the entire country. A decision was made to try a different approach to improve the logistics of the latter stages of publication. Instead of a subcommittee, the new arrangement will use an editor, associate editor, and an editorial board with typesetting, printing and distribution handled from a single location to speed the process. We would like to thank the original newsletter committee, Louisa Tabatabai, Mel Billingsley, Bakshy Chibber, J. Lawrence Fox, Michael Moore and William Morgan for their initial efforts in getting the newsletter off the ground.
A number of new areas that should be supported by formation of new subcommittees similar to the current research subcommittees were identified and include: mass spectrometry, peptide synthesis, protein and peptide sample preparation, and DNA sequencing/synthesis. The initial expansion in this area will be a peptide synthesis/MS subcommittee. A nominations committee was also initiated to completely dissociate this process from the Executive Committee. Other areas that are largely in the planning stages include methods for increased education of users, instrument operators and administrators, and management training for core facility personnel.
Mechanisms for improving the financial stability of the organization and other operational details were discussed. While the meeting was quite productive, much remains to be done as the Association continues to mature.
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Created: 10th August 1995
Last modified: 10th August 1995