In 2019, the Biophysical Society of China -- the BSC -- strived to improve its organization of academic conferences, highlight the advantages of the society and create high-level and high-quality academic conferences.

By playing the role of the main channel for academic exchanges, the BSC strived to nurture prosperous academic exchange, promote the development of academic disciplines, and strengthen academic cooperation at home and abroad and enhanced the academic leadership of the society.

By strengthening the core academic conference brand of the China Biophysical Congress, the BSC has also strived to develop a series of domestic and international symposia, such as conferences on membrane biology, calcium signaling and cell functions, cryo-electron microscopy, metabolic biology and nanobiology.

Through the measures of integrating the functions of its website, refining the process of receiving experts, customizing different conference experiences and simplifying participation procedures, among all the conferences held by the BSC in 2019, international conferences accounted for more than 50 percent of the total and more than 80 Nobel laureates and Chinese and foreign academicians attended the conferences.

1. The 17th Chinese Biophysical Congress

The 17th Chinese Biophysics Congress was held in Tianjin on Aug 2-5 last year and was chaired by academician Xu Tao, president of the congress, president of the BSC, vice-president of the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and director of the Frontier Science and Education Bureau of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

More than 1,000 scientific and technological workers and corporate  representatives from 11 countries -- including China, the United States, Germany, Norway, Australia, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, India, Saudi Arabia and Nigeria -- participated in the conference. They were joined by scientific and technological workers and company representatives from China's regions of Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan.

The participants conducted academic exchanges around the theme of "biophysics and human health".

Nine renowned experts at home and abroad made conference reports and frontier reports. The conference also set up 24 special sub-forums and special forums -- such as enterprise sub-meetings, academic sub-meetings, female scientist forums and a series of lectures on scientific career planning. The participants shared the latest achievements in biophysics-related disciplines at home and abroad in a productive academic atmosphere.

2. The ASBMB-BSC Symposium on the Interplay between Epigenetic Regulation and Genome Integrity

On Oct 20-24 last year, the First ASBMB-BSC Symposium on the Interplay between Epigenetic Regulation and Genome Integrity, jointly organized by the BSC and the American Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, or the ASBMB, was held in the city of Suzhou in East China's Jiangsu province.

With the theme of "epigenetics and human health", the symposium brought together researchers from various disciplines in fields related to genome stability and epigenetics at home and abroad. It invited 30 internationally renowned scientists in the field – from the US, France, the Netherlands and other countries, including two academicians from the National Academy of Sciences in the US and one academician from the Academy of Europe, as well as China's top scientists -- to present reports.

During the symposium, three especially invited reports were tabled, as well as 26 invited reports, 13 oral reports and one technical exchange report, as well as two wall display areas were set up. The latest research results in recent years from at home and abroad were presented and the latest progress made in scientific frontiers in domestic and foreign fields were also exchanged. The conference promoted the application of epigenetics in the diagnosis and treatment of human diseases and the development of precision medicine.

The symposium also set up a Travel Award and other awards and activities. The editors-in-chief of seven leading international magazines, including editors-in-chief from Science, were also invited to participate in the selection. Science, also widely referred to as Science Magazine is the peer-reviewed academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, or the AAAS, making it one of the world's top academic journals.

The activities provided more opportunities for young scientific researchers in the fields of epigenetics and chromatin biology in China -- and presented the possibility of face-to-face communications with top international magazine editors for domestic research teams and young scientific researchers.

In addition, the activities also improved the possibility of Chinese scholars publishing papers in leading magazines and also provided a platform for communications and the promotion of the latest technologies and research methods in the field. It created a positive cooperation environment between domestic scholars and leading research teams from abroad and played a positive role in promoting the cultivation of young talent.

Biophysical Society of China conferences in 2019 (2)