MINUTES
Drug
Metabolism Division Business Meeting
American
Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics
Orlando,
FL, April 2001
The meeting was convened at 5:30 PM.
New and Departing members of the Executive Committee
– The Chair (Dennis Koop) welcomed the new members of the executive
committee, Richard Okita (Chair-elect) and David Riddick
(Secretary/Treasurer-elect). Dennis
also congratulated Paul Hollenberg as President-elect of ASPET.
Finally, Dennis thanked Eddie Morgan for his service as Past-Chair of the
Division for Drug Metabolism and as a member of the ASPET Program Committee.
Ron Hines will assume the role as Division representative on the program
committee. Dennis Koop will remain
as the Division for Drug Metabolism representative on the Scientific Council.
Symposia – Several
members of the Executive Committee commented that the symposia and platform
sessions were well attended. Ron
Hines and Dennis Koop added that they were particularly pleased with the
participation of those who attended the Platform Session sponsored by the
Division.
The
symposium topics have been selected for EB 2002, which will be held in New
Orleans in April 2002. The topics
include: “Regulation and function of human extrahepatic cytochrome P450"
(Xinxin Ding); “Post-transcriptional regulation of drug metabolizing
enzymes” (Dennis Koop); and “Regulation and pharmacogenetics of the flavin-containing
monooxygenases”, (Ron Hines).
The IUPHAR Meeting will be held in July 7-12, 2001
in San Francisco. There will be
symposia on "Structure-function of cytochromes P450: Implications for drug
metabolism, drug design, and drug therapy" (James Halpert), and
"Biological Relevance of Cytochrome P450 Epoxygenase-Derived Eicosanoids"
(Darryl Zeldin). Magnus
Ingelman-Sundberg will also be presenting a Plenary lecture entitled, "Pharmacogenetics:
individual susceptibility to drugs and toxins".
Best Paper Awards - The winners of
the James R. Gillette Best Paper Awards were: Erin G. Schuetz, Wolfgang Schmid,
Gunther Schutz, Cynthia Brimer, Kazuto Yasuda, Tetsuya Kamataki, Lester Bornheim,
Kathy Myles, and Timothy J.Cole, Drug Metab. Dispos. (2000) 28: 268-278 (Drug
Metabolism), and Diem Cong, Margaret Doherty, and K. Sandy Pang, Drug Metab.
Dispos. (2000) 28: 224-235 (Disposition and Pharmacokinetics).
Perspectives in Pharmacology –
Dennis Koop reported on the Perspectives in Pharmacology reviews that were
solicited by JPET. Dennis sent a
request to the membership, and received thirteen nominations.
The top two were: Dan Liebler (Proteomics)
and Mary Vore (Transporters). Mary
Vore has agreed to write the first review on “Multi-drug Resistance-Associated
Proteins” (MRPs).
EB
2003 – Richard Okita
will be soliciting suggestions for symposium topics for EB 2003 in San Diego.
Description of Responsibilities of Division
Officers – Several of the other ASPET divisions are having difficulty
with the transition of officers, and identifying the necessary duties for these
officers. For example, individuals
in the “elect” positions from these divisions have not been participating in
their Division and Executive committee meetings.
Consequently, when they become the Chair (or Secretary/Treasurer) for the
division, they do not have an understanding of their responsibilities.
Therefore, several ASPET divisions have requested that we provide a
written description of the job functions of the officers of our division.
Dennis Koop will be compiling this information.
The Secretary/Treasurer will serve on the ASPET
nominating committee in alternate years.
Web
Site – Ray Novak
suggested that additional information about the Division be put on a Web Site.
Wayne Backes reported that the Division currently has a Web Site, but it
only contains certain basic information such as the list of officers, Division
News, and the Minutes from the latest Division meeting.
The Executive Committee has agreed to move forward with a major upgrade
of the Division Web Site. There
were several suggestions on information that could be included on the Web Site.
Some of these items include: Division news, Member information, Division
officers and their duties, Job opportunities, links to investigator Web Sites,
links to meetings, announcements of awards, symposia, election results, and
links to journals. We anticipate that there will also be a research area of the
Web Site with links to research resources.
Wayne Backes will coordinate this effort. Once an outline of the Web Site is assembled, it will be sent
to the Executive Committee and the Division membership for suggestions.
At-Large
Members of the Nominating Committee – Sandy Pang
(University of Toronto) and John Chiang (Northeastern Ohio Univ. Coll. Med.)
were elected as the at-large members of the nominating committee.
The Committee will provide a slate of candidates for the next Division
election for Chair-elect and Secretary/Treasurer-elect.
Division-Specific Programming for EB 2002 in
New Orleans – Jim Halpert discussed the demands for personnel with
expertise in drug metabolism, pointing out that industry is recruiting
scientists earlier and earlier in their training for permanent positions, many
without postdoctoral experience. This
has led to difficulty for academic scientists trying to recruit postdoctoral
fellows with experience in drug metabolism.
Several Division members agreed with these concerns.
Ron Franklin pointed out that different companies had different
philosophies on hiring scientists, with Merck looking for people with analytical
skills, whereas other companies looking for individuals with a more biological
background. There was a proposal
made by the Chair to set-up a Round-Table discussion on this topic as the
Division-Specific Program for the Division for Drug Metabolism.
There were suggestions from the floor that there could be representatives
from industry, academics, postdoctoral fellows, newly hired faculty, newly hired
industry scientists, and a representative from NIH.
This proposal was approved by the membership in attendance.
Dennis Koop will contact potential participants for this program.
It was also suggested that he contact Ron Shibuski, since the Division
for Drug Discovery may also be interested in co-sponsoring this program.
Graduate Student Best Paper Awards –
Ron Franklin reviewed the procedures for selection of the graduate student
awards. This year, there was some
additional confusion, at least in part due to ASPET setting aside a specific
time for judging of the Graduate Student Best Paper Awards.
The procedure used this year was to request those individuals competing
for the award to submit, in advance, a Power-Point presentation of their talk or
poster, and the judging carried out prior to the meeting.
The winners were selected based on the Power-Point presentations,
announced at the platform session and presented a check and a certificate at the
Division for Drug Metabolism mixer. It
was decided that a similar procedure be followed next year.
Ron Franklin suggested that we remove the statement that the winners will
be presenting at the platform session, because several of the graduate student
presenters had requested poster sessions. In
the future, those winners presenting a poster will have a ribbon to be displayed
with the poster. In addition, the
winners will be announced at the platform session and the award and certificate
will be presented at the mixer. The
Division is also considering presenting a plaque to both winners as well.
New Business – A question was
raised regarding how to get better participation from investigators from foreign
countries. Efforts will be made to
increase foreign participation in Division functions.
