The Meeting Was Called to Order at 1:10PM by David Martinsen

Minutes, CINF Executive Committee Meeting

Sofitel, Montpelier Room

Saturday, August 16, 2008

The meeting was called to order at 1:10PM by David Martinsen.

Present were:

Dave Martinsen, Chair

Svetlana Korolev, Chair Elect

Erja Kajosalo, Past Chair

Judith Currano, Secretary

Marge Matthews, Treasurer

Bonnie Lawlor, Councilor

Leah Solla, Program Chair 2007-2008

Rajarshi Guha, Program Chair 2009-2010

Graham Douglas, Fundraising Chair

Charles Huber, Alternate Councilor 2009

Eileen Shanbrom, representing Membership Chair Silvia Lee

Pamela Scott, Alternate Councilor

Beth Thomsett-Scott (dialed in), Publications Committee

Song Yu, Education Committee

New Business

1. Election Results(David Martinsen)

The results of the 2008 CINF election were as follows.

Chair-Elect 2009: Carmen Nitsche

Treasurer 2009-2010: Meghan Lafferty

Councilor 2009-2011: Andrea Twiss-Brooks

Councilor 2009-2011: Charles Huber

1. Approval of Minutes (David Martinsen)

A motion to approve was made by Leah Solla and seconded by Erja Kajosalo. The motion carried unanimously.

1. Fundraising Committee Report (Graham Douglas)

The CINF Fundraising Committee is well ahead of its 2009 goals. Fundraising will cover the costs of travel for the Lucille Wert award recipient. Greg Banik has agreed to serve as assistant fundraising chair for this year and will use this experience to decide whether or not he wishes to continue as Fundraising Chair in 2009.

Action Item: Graham and Greg will discuss and update the procedures for the Fundraising Chair and add them to Guenter’s fundraising document.

Action Item: Graham has obtained artwork from the Chemical Information Bulletin and will use it to create smaller sponsor signs. He will also obtain a wheeled case in which to keep them.

Leah Solla thanked Graham for obtaining funding for the Herman Skolnik Award Symposium and reception, which was not easy.

Action Item: Dave and Graham will discuss legal procedures for getting corporate sponsors for the Herman Skolnik Award symposium and reception.

Graham indicated that CINF needs to address the sustainability of the tasks that Fundraising has begun, such as functionary funding and fundraising for technical sessions, which was done on an experimental basis. There is no consensus from the fundraising committee as to how this should be done; Graham thinks that fundraising for technical sessions, aside from the Herman Skolnik Award Symposium, is nebulous. It is unclear whether or not the funds should be permanently budgeted, and, if so, from whence the money should come. The Fundraising Committee believed that symposia chairs should recruit funds for speakers and that the Fundraising Committee could facilitate the bill paying.

The Program Committee indicated that they are trying to get a hard item line in the budget for speaker registration. Registration costs are fixed, and the symposia chairs can each be given a set number of guest registrations to use for a session. Travel costs for guest speakers are never promised, but it would be nice for the Program Committee to know if there is money available for that. The symposia chairs are not comfortable with fundraising, but the Program Committee would be willing to give the Fundraising Committee a list of companies that are involved in a given session so that they can raise funds.

1. Harry’s Party(Graham Douglas)

FIZ is interested in making Harry’s Party a formal party and that they are committed to supporting it in a manner similar to CAS’s sponsorship of the CINF Welcoming Reception. Currently, the party begins at 5PM, during the Open Meeting. If Harry’s Party does become an official CINF event, it should not conflict with the Open Meeting, it will need to be scheduled four months in advance, and the Division Chair will need to be informed of the details.

Action Item: Graham or Dave will discuss the details with Rene and determine the next steps to take.

1. Luncheon Subsidy

The luncheon can remain sponsored; it is easy to make a pitch to a sponsor because it is an appealing event.

1. Functionary Funding

CINF will fund up to three functionaries per meeting for two meetings a year. Each individual would receive $600 towards the meeting costs. In 2008, four functionaries were funded at the spring meeting and 2 at the fall meeting. This was successful, in that it allowed individuals to participate who would not otherwise have been able to attend the meeting. However, it did not meet the goal of eliciting involvement from younger members. Methods of securing funds for the continuation of this program were discussed, and Graham indicated that it might be more difficult to do fundraising for functionary travel than for speaker travel.

1. Electronic Balloting

The bylaw amendment to permit electronic balloting passed, and a taskforce is needed to implement this method of voting. Three to five individuals are needed to form the taskforce, Erja Kajosala and Bonnie Lawlor volunteered to participate, and Lisa Balbes is willing to serve in an advisory capacity.

Action Item: Dave will convene the taskforce on electronic balloting.

One of the issues to decide was whether or not CINF can rely completely on electronic ballots in the 2009 election or whether a hybrid election is needed. The cost of electronic balloting is so low that it is possible to reevaluate this decision if a problem. For the 2009 election, there will probably be a postcard, as well as an e-mail, sent to the members, in lieu of a paper ballot. One possible problem is that members’ e-mail addresses may not be up-to-date.

Action Item: The taskforce will examine all issues and return a recommendation to the Executive Committee.

1. FIGS (Focused Interest Group) Proposal

FIGS is a low-barrier way for people to create interest groups within ACS without requiring them to have “membership” and undergo the trial division period. They are, therefore, more fluid and virtual than traditional divisions. Erja indicated that it had been suggested that academics should form their own subgroup, which is not desirable for CINF. Bonnie mentioned that FIGS may have benefits for larger divisions but that it does not particularly impact CINF at this time.

1. Openings on the Committee on Science

Guenter Grethe was nominated to an open position on the Committee on Science. There is a small division opening, as well, and CINF should think about making a nomination. It is a high-profile committee, so, someone with a doctorate might be preferable.

1. Committee on Professional Training (CPT)

CINF still needs a representative to deliver the CINF perspective at the CPT open meeting.

Action Item: Dave will ask Adrienne Kozlowski if she is willing.

1. Committee Reports

1. Finance(Marge Matthews)

The luncheon line in the budget was in error, and it has been corrected. It is estimated that the Chemical Information Bulletin (CIB) is subsidized $4000-$4500, meaning that the ad income for the bulletin is about $4500 less than needed. This raised the question of whether the print bulletin was still viable. Comments from the committee indicated that a pdf version would be acceptable and that it could be combined with the CINF E-News to form a quarterly publication. Some things to consider with a format change are the effect of this format on advertisers, as well as the format desires of the membership.

Action Item: The Executive Committee will voice all of these concerns to the Publications Committee, who will provide feedback and make a recommendation. A survey will likely be drafted and sent to the membership to determine their needs and desires. The Executive Committee will make the final decision about the format of the CIB.

1. 2009 Budget (Svetlana Korolev)

The 2009 budget was distributed, and the following points were discussed.

• The speaker travel support line was moved from the technical sessions section to the social events section because such support should not been guaranteed by the division, but might be available from fundraising. The speaker registration line ($11,000) was in place for the technical sessions section.
• $3000 were budgeted for electronic balloting.
• There are still about $5000 left from the CIC/CINF Innovative Grants Fund, which is not included in the budget.
• We plan to send two people, Chair-Elect and Treasurer, to the ACS Leadership Summit. We pay for the registration and travel, and ACS pays for the hotel and food.
• The Luncheon expenses should probably be distributed in two lines: one under social events (as we planned to find a sponsor for the luncheon in 2009) and another individual entry as “luncheon ticketed”.
• Committee expenses were reduced slightly for a few of the committees. We do not have all of the bills yet.
• Membership dues seem to be slightly lower this year, and we have not yet gotten the second dues payment from ACS. Based on the size of last year’s payments, we are going to come out far below our dues projection.
• The Herman Skolnik Award travel should stay in the budget. It must be paid even if fundraising is not secured.
• We have agreed with CSA Trust that we will pay up to $400 for advertising costs for the International Conference on Chemical Structures. Although, to date, we have never paid this money, there must be a line for it in the budget each year, since the meeting is annual.

Action Item: Svetlana will make the adjustments to the budget, and the Executive Committee will vote via e-mail to pass the final budget.

1. Publications (Beth Thomsett-Scott)

There is a candidate for the position of CIB Editor, but she is based outside of the United States. The Committee stated that this would not be a problem, given the fact that everything is done digitally. Beth is waiting for this individual’s resume, since it is important to ensure that the candidate is qualified for the position.

Beth would like to step down as CINF E-News editor, and this position needs to be filled, as does that of the CIB Subscriptions Manager.

Action Item: Suggestions for candidates for Subscriptions Manager and CINF E-News Editor should be sent to Beth.

The last time that the membership was surveyed about their desired format for the CIB, about 20-40 individuals were strongly in favor of a print bulletin. Since the financial situation has worsened, the Executive Committee should either make a decision itself or send a survey to the membership, explaining the situation and giving economic options. Advertising is still possible with an electronic bulletin, and, since it would not need to subsidize the bulletin, it could become an income-generating mechanism. There was a request that the content of the bulletin be diversified to include information of interest to informatics people, especially as a digital bulletin would not have a limit on pages. Suggestions on future content included the following.

• Solicit topics via the ACS Member Network
• Have speakers write up full papers, based on their presentations, if this will not interfere with their publication plans
• Give more detailed information about the Herman Skolnik Award recipient
• Provide summaries of the various symposia, with a core group of reporters who will profile the sessions

These suggestions indicate that it would be desirable to roll the CINF E-News into the new, digital CIB and publish four issues annually, once before and once after each National Meeting. Since the CIB is a member benefit, there was some concern over when it should be rolled into the open-access archive. The consensus was that each issue might appear in the archive as soon as the next is published.

Action Item: Beth will inform the Publications Committee that the Executive Committee wishes to move to an e-only CIB for financial reasons. If there is no reasonable objection, this communication will be passed on to the membership.

The CINF Salary Survey was also discussed as a member benefit, and it was suggested that it be linked to the ACS Salary Survey and become a benefit for all members.

Action Item: Dave will explore the option of hosting the Salary Survey on ACS’s pages, rather than CINF’s.

There is some Innovative Grants money left over, which could appropriately be used to move Val ’s archives to Philadelphia. There are 13 boxes, which can be shipped to the Chemical Heritage Foundation (CHF). If the materials that we wish to archive go beyond 50 linear feet, there will be a charge of $300/year. Since this will not require all of the remaining funds, some can also be allocated to the growth of the archive. CHF will go through the materials, photocopy acid-based materials, put spectacular things on display, and generally make them available to anyone who needs to use them. However, they will not digitize them and deliver the images to us; we must do this ourselves.

Action Item: As soon as Eileen returns to work, she will ask Val to send those boxes that are ready directly to CHF. The remainder will be sent to Bonnie, who will weed them, send items to be digitized to Beth, and send the remainder of the items to CHF.

Action Item: The 50-year history must be located and digitized.

Action Item: An agreement must be signed with CHF. Bonnie will send the agreement to Dave, who will get input from the Executive Committee, if necessary.

1. Program Committee (Leah Solla and Rajarshi Guha)

For the Philadelphia meeting, there were 79 submitted papers and three withdrawals. On Sunday evening, the Scholarship for Scientific Excellence posters will be collocated with the CINF reception. The Awards Committee will select three winning posters, and the winners will be announced at the CINF Luncheon on Tuesday. The Herman Skolnik Award Symposium will take place all day on Monday, and the award itself will be presented at 4:45PM, with a reception to follow in the evening. The Joint Board-Council Committees on CAS and Publications will hold their open meeting on Monday at 5PM.

The theme for the Philadelphia meeting is Drugs and Health, and Guenter, representing MPPG, coordinated a special set of programs relating to this theme. CINF, TOXI, MEDI, and COMP cosponsored the programming, and CINF took the lead on a session about data mining and text mining, as it relates to drug design. Brochures detailing CINF-sponsored symposia will be left outside all conference rooms.

The Program Committee thanked all session organizers. The diversity of CINF has been a challenge and a blessing to the program, and the division is moving in many different directions.

The Innovative Grant for the award symposium will begin at the Fall meeting in Washington, DC. This will affect programming because we will need to decide which sessions get selected for this award symposium.

In Salt Lake City, there are eight sessions already established with organizers and six additional sessions that will be added after the Philadelphia meeting. There are four sessions on nanotechnology, which is the theme of the meeting. Oaysis will open on August 25, and close on October 20. Session organizers will have access until November 3, and then all changes will need to be made through Rajarshi.

The theme for the Washington, DC, Fall meeting in the fall is globalization. This is fully programmed, with sessions on intellectual property, patents, copyright, intellectual property education, chemical text mining, and semantic information in journals. Obviously, the proximity to federal agencies is a big draw.

The San Francisco Spring meeting is also very well programmed. The theme there is green chemistry for a sustainable world, and CINF’s sessions focus on the multidisciplinary use of chemical information for green chemistry, including data preservation and archiving, a joint session with CSA Trust. So far, sixteen sessions are filled, although we anticipate adding a few more.

The Boston 2010 Fall meeting will focus on chemistry for the prevention and treatment of diseases. So far, one topic is committed: informatics and high content screening – applications to the pharmaceutical areas. At this meeting, we will hold the Herman Skolnik Award Symposium, as well as the Tri-Society Symposium. Most of the sessions programmed for Boston are place-holders at the moment, but we anticipate many symposia dealing with disease, pharmaceuticals, consumer health information, and a hot-topic session on the area of translational science.

A proposal for a session on the theme of polypharmacology has been accepted for Pacifichem, December 2010. CINF will be jointly sponsoring this session with several other groups. The organizers for the session are Guenter Grethe and Rajarshi Guha (ACS CINF), Tsuneaki Sakata (Chemical Society of Japan), Corey Nislow (Canadian Chemical Society), and Richard Horuk (ACS).

1. MPPG(Guenter Grethe)

The MPPG steering committee divided into subcommittees to address various issues, one of which is thematic programming. This subcommittee, of which Guenter is a member, is responsible for finalizing the themes, presenting them to the steering committee, looking at subtopics, and finding organizers for these subtopics. The themes for the 2010 meetings are now fixed; those for the 2011 and 2012 meetings are still tentative.