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Get an inside look into a successful, sustainable conference

11 July 2024

It can be problematic to perfectly blend social, environmental and financial goals when organising an academic event, but we think that Chrissy Hammond (University of Bristol) and her co-organisers Lizzie Lawrence, Joanna Moss, Nikki Stevenson and Rabia Sevil rose to the challenge at The Dynamic matrix: mechanics, ageing and repair Conference, a British Society for Matrix Biology (BSMB) meeting. We were delighted to support this event from our Fund for Innovations in Sustainable Conferencing and Scientific Meeting Grants, and we are keen to continue supporting events like this in the future.

We are very grateful to Chrissy for welcoming us at this event. We had the opportunity to talk with the main stakeholders involved in the planning process and we would like to share with you some of the good practices they implemented whilst organising a green meeting.

Inaugural Global South Workshop is held in South Africa

17 June 2024

We were delighted to host our inaugural Global South Workshop, organised by Kênia Bícego (São Paulo State University, Brazil) and Andrea Fuller (University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa) and held at Kruger National Park, South Africa in March 2024. Our Global South Workshop is part of our ongoing commitment to diversifying our Workshop programme so that we can support a wider selection of research communities around the world.

Sustainable menus at events: nurturing with less impact (part 2)

11 April 2024

At any event food is an integral part of your attendees’ experience. However, managing the impact of food choices is not straightforward in terms of sustainability. In this blog, we look at some more tips to help make the menus at your upcoming events more sustainable. In case you missed it, check out part 1 of this guide.

Fund for Innovations in Sustainable Conferencing – new name, but same support

7 March 2024

We are delighted to see that the biology community has been showing their natural creativity by experimenting with different conference models  (Lowell et al. 2022) and we have been very pleased to support some of these experiments with funding through our Sustainable Conferencing Grants.

To signal our enthusiasm for supporting innovation The Company of Biologists have changed the name of our funding scheme to the Fund for Innovations in Sustainable Conferencing. Our funding criteria have not changed, so not all funding requests need to be highly innovative, but we especially encourage requests for funding to test new and innovative ways of delivering events, whether these are small changes or big ones.

One recent example of a conference that we supported was the European Society for Developmental Biology meeting in September 2023, which took place across three different regional venues.

A visit to The Forest of Biologists

18 January 2024

Our Publisher Claire Moulton recently visited the two Woodland Trust UK sites where we are planting new native trees for published Research and Review papers and protecting ancient woodland on behalf of our peer reviewers.

The Forest of Biologists shortlisted for ALPSP Impact Award 2024

28 June 2024

Screenshot of The Forest of Biologists website, highlighting a tree planted for an article published in JCS

We are very proud that The Forest of Biologists has been shortlisted for the ALPSP Impact Award 2024. This is a great recognition for a project that we have thoroughly enjoyed launching and that we feel makes a true impact to both the scientific community and the natural environment.

Inclusion, diversity and social sustainability at meetings

11 June 2024

Sustainable practices are often seen as actions that minimise environmental impact. According to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) proposed by the UN, sustainable practices include themes such as environmental protection, the fight against poverty, inclusion, and collaboration.

While many of our blogs explore tips on how to minimise the environmental impact of events, in this blog we will talk about the social aspects of sustainability and how to approach them when organising a conference.

Going belowground: exploring the protective role of isoprene in plant roots at the Sharkey lab

26 March 2024

Manuel Bellucci in the lab

Isoprene is a biogenic volatile compound emitted by many different plants. Above ground, this compound protects plants from a range of abiotic and biotic stresses. But what happens belowground is less clear and it is this question that fascinated Manuel Bellucci, a PhD student in the Department of Science and Technology for Sustainable Development and the Campus Bio-Medico of the University of Rome (Italy).

Our plans for sustainable Workshops in 2024

29 January 2024

As we all continue to manage the challenges of global warming and biodiversity loss, it is important that the events industry embraces new and emerging technologies to play our part in contributing in the fight against climate change.

Last year, The Company of Biologists reinforced our commitment to making our Workshops more sustainable. We are now looking forward to our 2024 Workshop programme and will continue to implement all we have learned last year, as well as explore new ideas that can help mitigate the impact of our events.

Uniting researchers working with unconventional experimental organisms – Development Journal Meeting 2023 

9 January 2024

Development’s Journal Meeting, Unconventional and Emerging Experimental Organisms in Cell and Developmental Biology, took place from 17 to 20 September 2023 at the beautiful Wotton House in Surrey, UK. 

In the opening remarks of the Meeting, Katherine Brown, the Executive Editor of Development, made the case for the developmental biology field to expand their horizons. Traditional models like flies, mice, and fish, while invaluable, are not the be-all and end-all of developmental biology. The need for diversity in the study of life’s fundamental processes has become strikingly clear in recent years.  

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