PRESIDENT'S LETTER

Rick Amasino

Looking Forward

I would like to begin my term as president of ASPB by thanking the membership for the privilege of serving our Society. The year I spent as president-elect led me to a deeper appreciation of the strength and value of ASPB. We are fortunate to have a dedicated, energetic, and creative staff at our headquarters in Rockville, and a membership replete with individuals who are willing to devote much precious time and effort to keeping our Society thriving.

One of the things I did not fully appreciate until recently was the wide range of activities in which the Society is engaged. In addition to our traditional activities of publishing two of the leading journals in plant biology—Plant Physiology and The Plant Cell—and hosting the annual meeting, we have many projects under way in the areas of education, recruitment of minorities, and public affairs, to name a few. Some of the educational efforts of our members extend well beyond the classroom to engage the general public in the wonders of plants. For example, Roger Hangarter’s sLowlife exhibit (http://plantsinmotion. bio.indiana.edu/usbg/), which is designed to increase awareness of something we take for granted—that plants can sense and respond to their environment—has been at the U.S. Botanic Garden and will be at the Chicago Botanic Garden and other venues as well. There are many more exciting projects in the pipeline designed to educate the public about our discipline that you will read about in future issues of this newsletter.

One new effort that I want to bring to the membership’s attention is the ASPB Diversity Bank. I am sure we all agree that it is important to increase diversity among plant biologists. The ASPB Minority Affairs Committee established the Diversity Bank as a web-based resource to facilitate the connections that will expose students to plant research and to foster networking between faculty at minority and non-minority institutions (seminars, summer research opportunities, etc.). This effort is broader than recruiting minority students to plant biology. There is tremendous value in familiarizing students with science regardless of their ultimate career choice. Indeed, as a society we would greatly benefit from a better understanding of science among those who are not in scientific careers. I urge you to visit the site at http://www.aspb.org/diversitybank.

This year I look forward to working with the membership, staff, president-elect Rob McClung, and immediate past president Mike Thomashow to keep ASPB at the forefront of scientific societies. And last but not least, I want to thank Roger Hangarter personally and on behalf of ASPB, not only for his past three years of leadership as president-elect, president, and past president, but for the many other ASPB offices he has held, and for his current service on the Education Foundation and as chair of the ASPB–Pioneer Hi-Bred International Graduate Student Prize Committee.

Richard Amasino
amasino@biochem.wisc.edu