Dear ASV Members,

This year, once again, our terrific community of scientists has come together to tackle critical issues facing virology and science. The ability of scientists to guide and regulate our own research is under direct threat. The US government has proposed major changes to the oversight of virology research, including any kind of work that is perceived as “gain of function” – which, depending on how this phrase is understood, can be applied very broadly to our work. Many in our ASV community have engaged in advocacy at all levels to try to prevent legislation that would block our ability to do urgently necessary work – and to propose oversight that ensures authentic safety. Ongoing work on this issue will be critical and we will be sending updates about what you can do to help us take proper responsibility for guiding the directions of virology research. In the long run, safety must include progress at understanding and thereby combating emerging pathogens. I am hugely grateful to all of you doing this work to protect virology research.

Misinformation about what we do as virologists has had a huge role in the growing push from non-scientists to limit research. We need to understand the roots and effects of the misinformation – and this is why the ASV 2024 Keynote Address is on misinformation in science (more on that below).

I’m also so very proud of all the many successful efforts by our community to bring together virologists and the glorious diversity of all who care about virology. From the fantastic success of the Global Scholars program that connects us with colleagues from developing countries, to our highly engaged programs in diversity, to the childcare at meetings that enables those with young children to participate, the fabric is stronger and better as a result.

ASV 2023 Highlights

The 42nd Annual Meeting of the American Society for Virology was held in Athens, Georgia at the Classic Center and hosted by the University of Georgia, Athens. Our second year back in person had the largest turnout of any ASV meeting, with nearly 1800 attendees onsite! President Colin Parrish and the Program Committee assembled a terrific scientific program. Local host Mark Tompkins and his committee did a wonderful job of organizing the details of the local site. This was the first time the ASV meeting has been in Athens. In addition to the scientific sessions, workshops on effective communication, advocacy, and allyship in virology created a unique and exciting lineup. As always, seeing everyone and engaging in person was a very meaningful part of the meeting.

Highlights included the 2023 ASV awards presented at the meeting. I would like to tell you about these awards and the deserving recipients:

• The Wolfgang & Patricia Joklik Distinguished Service Award honors the founder of ASV and his service to ASV and is made possible by the donation from Wolfgang’s (Bill’s) wife Patricia Joklik. The award recognizes a current or past ASV member for outstanding long-term or significant service to our Society, our members, and to the science of virology. The 2023 awardee was ASV’s Secretary-Treasurer, Kathy Spindler.
• The Ann Palmenberg Junior Investigator Award was established to recognize junior investigators who have made significant contributions to the field of virology and who display exceptional promise. They are named in honor of former ASV President, Dr. Ann Palmenberg, University of Wisconsin-Madison, for her decades-long efforts to support and improve the annual meeting. This year’s recipients were Kellie Ann Jurado, University of Pennsylvania and Siyuan Ding, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.
• The Joel M. Dalrymple Memorial Award is dedicated to the memory of Joel McKeith Dalrymple, Ph.D., a brilliant and innovative scientist, scholar, and mentor, who with great humor and sensitivity was unfailingly dedicated to the support and guidance of junior scientists. The recipients of this award have demonstrated great promise for research by the clear and concise presentation of original data. Congratulations to Maria Gabriela Noval, New York University School of Medicine, for her talk in the Arboviruses workshop, entitled, “Mechanisms of chikungunya virus RNA persistence and inflammation in the cardiovascular system.”

ASV 2024

The 43rd ASV Annual Meeting, June 24-28, 2024, will be at the Greater Columbus Convention Center, hosted by The Ohio State University. Shan-Lu Liu and his colleagues, the Ohio State University local organizers, are planning an exciting event in Columbus, Ohio. I have just visited OSU and got to see a bit of Columbus, and I have to say, it’s delightful!

Our Keynote Address this year will be on “Misinformation in Science” given by Adam Berinsky, Professor of Political Science at MIT and Director of the MIT Political Experiments Research Lab. I am excited to think that many of you may engage with Adam and discuss ways we may participate as virologists in understanding misinformation and designing ways to address it.

The first Symposium session is on artificial intelligence, machine learning, and computation in virology. As for all the Symposia, I really encourage you to come up and meet the fantastic speakers, who are new to many of us and to ASV; reach across disciplines to expand our community. The second Symposium session is on virus-host interactions, to include structural virology and innate antiviral immunity. In the third Symposium, the topics focus on translating basic science to development of antivirals and vaccines and range from the field campaigns to combat Ebola and monkeypox to the development of the nanoparticles that make the mRNA vaccines possible. The fourth symposium centers on global eradication and prevention of viral illnesses, and here too – as in all the sessions – I hope you will reach across disciplines to meet and interact with these speakers with vastly diverse experiences.

There will be two ASV Satellite Symposia organized by Councilors: Michelle Flenniken's (Invertebrate Virology) on Unique and Conserved Aspects of Virus-Host Interactions, and Andrew Broadbent's (Veterinary Virology) called ‘A Veterinary Virapalooza: Improving the Control of Viral Diseases of Animals.’ This year there will be three additional satellite workshops: ‘Studying Bats Using a One Health Lens: Bridging the Gap Between Bat Virology and Disease Ecology,’ organized by Arinjay Banerjee, Stephanie Seifert, Hannah Frank, Daniel Becker, and Tony Schountz; ‘Virology in a Global Society,’ organized by Stacey Schultz-Cherry, Felicia Goodrum, Pedro Jimenez-Bluhm, Erik Karlsson, and Ana Vazquez-Pagan; and ‘Navigating Virology Funding Opportunities with NIH, NSF and USDA,’ organized by Joanna Shisler from NSF and Michelle Arnold from NIAID. Do strongly consider adding one or more of these satellites to your plans.

Program Committee Chair Moriah Szpara and the Program Committee have selected six fantastic State-of-the-Art speakers to complement the program of Workshop presentations and posters. Details of the program including Symposium plenary talks and Keynote, Satellite Symposia, and State-of-the Art lectures are available on the ASV 2024 website here.

The Keynote, Symposium sessions, State-of-the-Art lectures and all five satellites will be available online during and one month after the conference for those who register for the virtual component of ASV 2024. Making this content available online increases accessibility of the ASV annual conference to an audience that is unable to travel, and supports our mission of expanding our global connections.

Registration and abstract submission for ASV 2024 will go live in December. The abstract submission deadline this year is February 1, 2024. If you need an early decision to apply for a travel visa, please ensure you select this option when submitting your abstract.

The Global Scholar Award application opened this month, and the deadline to apply is November 30, 2023, allowing awardees enough time to secure visas.

You can find more information on the program, travel, abstract submission, and travel and registration awards online at asv.org/asv2024. Here are the deadlines:

November 30, 2023: Global Scholar Travel Award deadline.

December 2023: Registration and Abstract Submission go live.

February 1, 2024: Abstract submission deadline

February 6, 2024: Travel Award deadline

April 22, 2024: Early Bird Registration deadline (last day to receive registration discount)

The Society will again provide onsite childcare during the annual meeting, engaging with KiddieCorp, who provided the service in 2022 and 2023. In addition to onsite childcare, ASV provides financial support for those who need dependent care through the ASVCares program. You can find out more about ASVCares and Onsite Childcare for ASV 2024 here.

The ASV Annual Meeting would not be possible without the support from our member donors and sponsors. We are truly grateful for your support. If you would like to make a tax-deductible donation or if you have a corporate contact with interest in contributing to ASV, please contact the ASV Office ([email protected]).

Society Updates

• ASV Council approved an update to the membership policy for members from low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Membership dues will be waived for new and current members performing research activities in low- to middle-income countries. You can find more information here.
• Travel awards for the annual meeting will now cover the full cost of registration to the meeting. Recipients will be provided a registration waiver for the annual meeting. Find out more about ASV 2024 travel awards here.
• The Society has partnered with the Australasian Virology Society and the World Virology Society. These partnerships were initiated by ASV’s Global Partnerships and Advocacy Committee (GPAC). GPAC will continue to seek out new global partnerships to help foster collaboration, outreach, and advocacy with the global community of virologists.
• The Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion committee launched a mentorship program to connect mentees with potential mentors. Find more about the mentorship program here.
• ASV Council has approved Endowed Lectureships in honor of Jim and Ellen Strauss and in honor of Mavis Agbandje-McKenna. Contributions to these endowed lectureships can be made through the ASV member website or by contacting the ASV Office.
• The Council has also approved the naming of Plenary and State of the Art Lectureships for 3-year periods in honor of those who have contributed meaningfully to the field of virology and to the development and activities of ASV over the years. In 2023 and for 2024 and 2025, ASV named a lectureship after Dr. Kathryn Holmes and one after the late Dr. A. Oveta Fuller. Two more will be named for 3-year terms beginning at the ASV 2024 meeting. ASV members are invited to make nominations for these named lectureships to the History and Archives and DEI Committees. To make a nomination, please contact the ASV Office for guidelines.
• In Memoriam: ASV members or members of the virology community who have died in the past year whose information has recently been added to the website include Dr. Oveta Fuller, Dr. Nicholas Muzyczka, Dr. Michael Oldstone, and Dr. Robert Lamb.
• We appreciate and welcome the service of members interested in participating in ASV’s mission. If you are interested in serving on a committee, please contact us at [email protected] and/or speak to the current chair of a committee that interests you.

Reminders and News for ASV Members

• Renew your membership now. The benefits to ASV membership include reduced registration for the annual meeting, eligibility for travel awards, ASVCares awards, and discounted onsite childcare. Membership is required for trainees to apply for travel awards.
• The ASV website is a resource of other virology-related conferences too. You can visit the ASV Meetings page for links and information. ASV is also affiliated with virology-focused scientific journals, some of which offer discounted publication rates. For information, please visit https://asv.org/affiliated-journals.
• And don’t forget about ASV’s Virology Jobs site— this is a great resource for recruiting postdocs and technicians. Members and nonmembers can post virology jobs here.
• Viruses 2024 - A World of Viruses conference is in Barcelona from February 14th to 16th, 2024. Because Viruses is an affiliated journal of ASV, ASV members will receive a 100 EUR discount on registration fees. Find out more here.

I look forward to seeing all of you – please register now for ASV 2024 in Columbus, Ohio and send in your abstracts! Now as much as ever before, it is so critically important for us to come together as a community. I hope you will be as excited as I am about the new topics and the opportunities to reach across disciplines, learn from new fields, and expand the connections between us all across the globe. I’m excited to celebrate the explosion of talent in our wonderful trainees and truly cannot wait to see everyone again.

Best wishes for the holiday season and a peaceful 2024.

Sincerely,

Anne Moscona
President