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Towards inclusive and sustainable scientific meetings

Nature Cell Biology volume 25, pages 1557–1560 (2023)Cite this article

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Conferences are often held at different venues and feature innovative scientific programs; however, their design rarely changes, and barriers that exclude marginalized scientists persist. We discuss why this is a problem and offer suggestions for people and organizations seeking to create more inclusive and sustainable scientific meetings.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge our individual biases and privileges, which undoubtedly influenced this manuscript, and apologize for any oversights or omissions. We extend our thanks to all members of the @NewPICellDev community who attended the Emerging Concepts in Cell and Developmental Biology meeting in Denmark, at which some of the ideas included in this manuscript were implemented or discussed, as well as diversity strategist K. Knudsen (the Living Institute). S.M. is funded by a Medical Research Council (MRC) Career Development Award (MR/T010789/1). B.L.-L. is funded by a Springboard Award from the Academy of Medical Sciences, Wellcome Trust, Government Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, British Heart Foundation and Diabetes UK (SBF003/1170), and by the Elizabeth Blackwell Institute for Health Research, University of Bristol and the Wellcome Trust Institutional Strategic Support Fund (204813/Z/16/Z). U.L.M. is funded by North West Cancer Research (RDG2021.15) and the MRC (MR/X00855X/1), as well as by a European Molecular Biology Organization Installation Grant. S.E. is funded by the MRC (MR/R026610/1). R.M. is funded by a Sir Henry Wellcome fellowship (220464/Z/20/Z) and is also a paid member of the UK Committee on Research Integrity (UK CORI). V.A. is funded by EMBL Australia. F.M.D. is funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council (2003832) and the Novo Nordisk Foundation (NNF20OC009705). We are grateful for conference funding from the Novo Nordisk Foundation (NNF21OC0072611 and NNF20OC0062124), The Company of Biologists (SCG7) and the European Molecular Biology Organization (w21/19).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biomedicine, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark

    Silke Blair Chalmers & Felicity Mae Davis

  2. Biosciences Institute, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK

    Suzanne Madgwick

  3. School of Cellular and Molecular Medicine, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK

    Bethan Lloyd-Lewis

  4. Institute of Systems, Molecular and Integrative Biology, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK

    Urszula Lucja McClurg

  5. School of Biological Sciences, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK

    Salah Elias

  6. Institute for Life Sciences, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK

    Salah Elias

  7. Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark

    Peter Andersen

  8. UCL Cancer Institute, University College London, London, UK

    Ralitsa Madsen

  9. EMBL Australia Node in Single Molecule Science, Department of Molecular Medicine, School of Biomedical Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

    Vaishnavi Ananthanarayanan

  10. School of Pharmacy, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

    Felicity Mae Davis

  11. School of Biomedical Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

    Felicity Mae Davis

  12. Aarhus Institute of Advanced Studies, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark

    Felicity Mae Davis

  13. Danish Research Institute of Translational Neuroscience, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark

    Felicity Mae Davis

Authors
  1. Silke Blair Chalmers
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  2. Suzanne Madgwick
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  3. Bethan Lloyd-Lewis
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  4. Urszula Lucja McClurg
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  5. Salah Elias
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  6. Peter Andersen
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  7. Ralitsa Madsen
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  8. Vaishnavi Ananthanarayanan
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  9. Felicity Mae Davis
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Felicity Mae Davis.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Chalmers, S.B., Madgwick, S., Lloyd-Lewis, B. et al. Towards inclusive and sustainable scientific meetings. Nat Cell Biol 25, 1557–1560 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41556-023-01222-9

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