The recent 48th FEBS Congress in Milano, bringing together over 2000 participants from Europe and beyond for the big picture across biochemistry and molecular biology in summer 2024, also provided a great opportunity for reflections, special activities and a celebratory atmosphere for the 60th anniversary of FEBS.
On the opening day of the Congress a unique FEBS 60th anniversary session featured reflective and inspiring words from five former FEBS Secretary Generals (Profs Guy Dirheimer, Vito Turk, Julio Celis, Israel Pecht and Václav Pačes), whose positions at FEBS altogether stretched from 1984–2022. It also provided the occasion for the premiere of two FEBS videos, one providing insight into the development of FEBS activities over the decades, and the other giving an introduction to FEBS for young scientists.
- FEBS: 60 years in 60 seconds → https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVmLtHJKF9Q
- Federation of European Biochemical Societies (FEBS) → https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rE3DOvfWaA
For this FEBS 60th anniversary session it was also important to look ahead. To this end, it was an honour to gather together current leaders of several organizations supporting the biosciences to hear some of their thoughts on the topic of ‘Molecular Life Sciences: Shaping the Global Future Together‘. They were joined by a representative of FEBS Excellence Awardees for a view from the upcoming generation of scientific leaders. Themes touched on included global challenges and collaboration of regional organizations, the importance of basic sciences, and opportunities and challenges for the next generation.
Finally, this anniversary session at the start of the Congress was an excellent opportunity to congratulate the awardees of two new prizes launched for the FEBS 60th anniversary year that aim to recognize important contributions of scientists beyond research. First, the Israel Pecht Award (FEBS Recognition Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Molecular Biosciences Community) was presented to Profs László Fésüs, nominated by the Hungarian Biochemical Society, and Joan J. Guinovart, nominated by the Spanish Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. The aim of this award is to honour individuals whose remarkable efforts and dedication have greatly enhanced the activities of their respective FEBS Constituent Societies and fostered impactful collaboration with FEBS. And second, a new prestigious FEBS Education Award, to highlight and honour an educator with a distinguished teaching and training career path in the field of molecular life sciences, was presented to Prof. Robert A. Harris, nominated by the Swedish Society for Biochemistry, Biophysics & Molecular Biology. Read more about these new awards and the 2024 recipients here: Israel Pecht Award, FEBS Education Award.
Throughout the FEBS Congress, an exhibition of ten large selected images from entries into the FEBS 60th anniversary Bio-Art Image Contest: “The beauty behind biological sciences” had pride of place in the poster area.
The display provided an uplifting diversion for Congress participants, who were invited to vote for their favourite image. You can read more about the competition and see the five winning images from participant votes at https://www.febs.org/news/febs-60th-anniversary-bio-art-image-contest-results/.
In addition at this milestone of 60 years, FEBS wanted to draw attention at the Congress to the varied contributions to the research landscape of its Constituent Societies in many countries across Europe and neighbouring regions, as well as encourage networking of Congress participants with Society representatives, and between Societies. Towards this goal, the Societies were invited to showcase their unique history, accomplishments, current initiatives and future aspirations in poster format at the Congress. Following the Congress, you can now also view the Constituent Society posters in a FEBS Network post here: https://network.febs.org/documents/a-poster-gallery-of-febs-constituent-societies
Overall, the anniversary activities brought a joyful ambience as well as extra interest to the 2024 FEBS Congress. Participants received FEBS 60th anniversary tote bags with the logo ‘60 years by your side’, and the chance of winning a 60th anniversary T-shirt or hoodie created quite a stir, with some enthusiastic queuing at the FEBS stand to join in the fun.
What next? After the FEBS Congress, FEBS 60th anniversary activities continue.
In particular, we draw your attention to the thought-provoking FEBS Letters writing contest ‘Blueprints for the scientific society of tomorrow’. What is the utopian scientific Society like 60 years from now? What are the needs of future molecular life scientists? How can they be sustainably met by a scientific Society? The closing date for entries is 30 September 2024. For the full contest guidelines including how to submit your entry, see the FEBS Letters website announcement here: https://febs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/18733468/writing-contest
In this special year, FEBS has also awarded grants to its Constituent Societies to support interesting events or activities that highlight the impact and contributions of molecular life sciences, following a call for proposals earlier in 2024. These events are mostly taking place from September to December 2024, and you can browse the list of creative ideas from several Societies at https://www.febs.org/other-activities/febs-60th-anniversary/
For the marking of the 60th anniversary at FEBS Advanced Courses, an anniversary certificate and T-shirt are being awarded at each course to a young scientist participant for an outstanding poster/talk, as selected by the course organizers. Keep an eye out for features about the winners on the FEBS Network site.
Look out also for an e-book in support of Women in Science as part of the FEBS 60th anniversary activities, which is expected to be hosted on the FEBS website this autumn. Following an invitation to FEBS Constituent Societies to highlight outstanding women belonging to their Society, the book will show the diverse ways in which women navigate their careers in science alongside personal and family commitments.
A growing collection of posts on the FEBS Network related to the 60th anniversary of FEBS can be browsed here. They range from news on FEBS Constituent Society outreach activities awarded anniversary grants by FEBS, to reflections from members of the FEBS Executive Committee (such as one from the Chair of the FEBS Education and Training Committee), to posts from early-career researchers about the intersection of FEBS programmes with their career journeys (such as this post from a FEBS Excellence Awardee).
We take this opportunity to thank all those who have contributed so far to FEBS 60th anniversary activities as participants, organizers and collaborators to help make the year memorable and impactful.
