Recap of the 2020 Annual Meeting:
Mycology from the Cloud
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If you missed the meeting or loved it so much you want to watch it again, the content is available online to all MSA members.
You will need your MSA sign-on information.
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Though we were unable to meet in person this year due to the pandemic, we did have the unique experience of the first-ever virtual meeting of the MSA. It was host to over 500 attendees from 17 different countries. It included the usual components of an MSA meeting such as The Presidential Address, Karling Lecture, two informative symposia, Awards Ceremony, Poster and Graphical Abstracts, Business Meeting, Student Job Panel, and even an online Auction and Social. |
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2020 MSA Awards
Each year, the Mycological Society of America recognizes excellence in research, teaching, and service among its membership by celebrating students, teachers, and researchers.
For a summary of all MSA Awards, who is eligible, the award received, and the administering MSA committee please see the MSA Awards Chart. Click on each award title for additional information.
Below please find the complete list of 2020 awardees, and links to the biographies and photos if available.
All student travel awards will be available for use at the 2021 meeting in Boise, Idaho, or the 2022 meeting in Gainesville, Florida.
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Awardee Photos and Biographies |
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2020 MSA Poster Awards
Caroline Burks
Kasey Kiesewetter
Megan Keller
Valeria Flores Almaraz
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All Posters and Graphical Abstracts are posted on the MSA website and available to MSA members for viewing through the end of the year.
Your MSA sign-on information is required.
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Thank You!
MSA would like to thank our generous members, donors, and volunteers. A total of $6,935.00 was donated to various endowment funds during the meeting registration process! Donations to the MSA endowments keep our Society strong and help foster the growth of mycology as a discipline.
An additional $2,151.00 was raised during the online auction, to which 73 mushroom and fungi specialty items were donated. Thank you to everyone who contributed and bid on items and to everyone who bid!
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I am honored and humbled to serve as your 89th President of the Mycological Society of America (MSA). In this role I am committed to working together with all of you towards fulfilling our core and founding mission of advancing and promoting the science of mycology through education and research. During the past year, many of us have experienced the most challenging times of our lives. However, I remain optimistic that better times are on the horizon as we address the grand challenges of a global health pandemic and economic, racial, and social inequity while practicing resourceful cognitive, compassionate, and emotional empathy. As a member of MSA for almost 30 years, I continue to be impressed with the amazing level of selfless commitment, dedication, and enthusiastic volunteer service, coupled with outstanding leadership, mentorship and collaborative spirit exhibited by members of this Society. Volunteering is the heart and soul of MSA and I encourage all of you to become more involved with Society activities. The members of the General and Executive Councils and I are always willing to help you identify opportunities to increase your involvement in MSA.
In the coming year, we will be announcing and focusing our collective efforts on seven new strategic themes to: 1) build a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive Society; 2) increase educational resources, membership, and visibility (brand); 3) streamline committee structure, opportunities for collaborative cross-committee networking and initiatives; 4) improve budget-based decision-making processes and transition of shared management of Society activities by our management team, The Rees Group; 5) address contract renewal and advisory board expansion for our Society journal Mycologia; 6) revise and update the manual of operating procedures; and 7) showcase our fascinating and illustrious history with assistance from Meredith Blackwell through “Fungal Fables; The 'Morel' of the Story”. It is of great comfort to me to know that our Society is in very good financial health even in the current circumstances and that many members are already actively and enthusiastically engaged in addressing these strategic themes.
Thanks to those of you who attended the first-ever virtual MSA meeting in July as you helped make this meeting an overwhelming success. More than 500 people from 17 countries participated in the meeting. It was certainly a learning experience for all involved in organizing this historic virtual experience. The Program Committee is actively involved in organizing the upcoming joint MSA/Botanical Society of America Annual Meeting in Boise, Idaho. However, at this point in time the meeting format is not known (face-to-face, hybrid or online). We will continue to provide updates on the meeting as they become available.
In conclusion, I look forward to serving as your President and eventually interacting with all of you again in person. The Executive and General Councils and I are responsive to your concerns and needs; please feel free to bring them to our attention. As we continue to face current and impending challenges, our ability to engage in crucial, reflective conversations and exhibit care and compassionate support of each other will greatly strengthen our mycological community and family through interconnected resilience and solidarity. Thanks for being a member of the MSA community and family.
- Marc Anthony Cubeta
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Executive Vice President's Report |
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Greetings fellow MSA members!
I hope you all are safe. We conducted our first-ever virtual annual meeting, “MSA 2020: Mycology from the Cloud,” in late July with a record-breaking 516 attendees. The meeting content is on the MSA website (https://msafungi.org/2020-msa-virtual-meeting-content/) and available for viewing by any MSA member. The posters and graphical abstracts will be available for viewing (https://msafungi.org/poster-submission/) through the end of this year. We look forward to the joint meeting next year with the Botanical Society of America that is planned to take place in Boise, Idaho, July 17-22. See meeting announcements (https://msafungi.org/future-meetings/). We will keep you updated on any decisions regarding the format of the meeting (face-to-face, hybrid, virtual).
Council Business: The MSA Council meeting was held virtually via Zoom on July 20, 2020. The MSA Business Meeting was held Wednesday morning, July 22, 2020, via Zoom during the virtual Annual Meeting. The minutes are available here: (https://msafungi.org/msa-meeting-minutes-and-reports/).
Four email polls were approved by the MSA Council since my last column:
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MSA Poll 2020-05: Appointment of MSA councilor Matthew Kasson.
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MSA Poll 2020-06: Approval of Karling Annual Lecture Committee candidates.
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MSA Poll 2020-07: Approval of diversity via interchange, ambassadorship, and recruitment proposal.
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MSA Poll 2020-08: Approval of Mycologia Associate Editor Nominee Anna Ronikier.
New Members: I would like to extend a warm welcome to the following new members who joined MSA shortly before or since the last Annual Meeting. Their membership will be formally approved at the 2021 Annual Business Meeting planned for Boise, Idaho:
Australia: Justin Chan
Canada: Zeinab Robleh Djama, Annette Dodge, Tara Rintoul, Kirsten Slusarenko
Colombia: Martha Cardenas, Natalia Vargas
France: Monique Gardes, Melanie Roy, Agnese Seminara
Germany: Carlos Aguilar-Trigueros, Jaqueline Hess
India: Yu Fukasawa
Mexico: Maria Dolores Camacho López, Juan Pulido, Lucia Romero Hernández, Lluvia Beatriz Vargas Gastélum
Pakistan: Abdul Rehman Niazi
Philippines: Santiago Emil Joson
South Africa: Tuan Duong, Angel Maduke, Bernard Slippers, Dee Twiddy
Sweden: Faheema Kalsoom Khan
Taiwan: Pei-Yu Lin
United Kingdom: Rudy Diaz, James Irvine
United States: Rajaa Abdulrazzaq, Abeer Alqurashi, Austen Apigo, Bolívar Aponte Rolón, Suzette Baldwin, Yishai Barak, Jessica Bernardin, John Bickel, Robin Bradley, Corbin Bryan, Cynthia Bujanda, Gail Celio, Nadia Chacko, Robin Choudhury, Joseph Cinderella, Maria Izabel Costa de Novaes, Ernesto da Silva, Nabin Dangal, Hannah Dea, Cassandra Ettinger, Charlotte Francoeur, Nikita Gambhir, Jeff Garnas, Juanita Gil Bedoya, Jasmine Grey, Glen Groben, Cade Robert Harris, Jacob Heil, Madeline Henrickson, Son Hoang, Omoanghe Isikhuemhen, Erin James, Yi-Hong Ke, Laura Kelleher, Alexandra Kessler, Lily Khadempour, Eben Klein, Claudia Kumar, Abigail LaBella, Brittany Lebert, Serenella Linares, Dan Liu, Reid Longley, Allison Lord, Justina Martelli, Colin McManus, Nicholas Medina, Dan Meyers, Miguel Naranjo-Ortiz, Viviana Ortiz-Londono, Claudia Paez, Eric Pecina, Taylor Portman, Paul Price, Paul Przbylowicz, Luis Alberto Ramirez Camejo, Lauren Ré, Justin Shaffer, Jenifer Shapland, Kristen Sharpe, Katie Summers, Hannah Tomczak, Jane van der Schaaf, Jacob Venable, Emma Wallace, Emily Walsh, Clara Weidman, Mike Wiberg, Aric Wiest
2021 Membership Renewal: Renewal notices will be sent starting in October. Membership dues will remain the same. We now have autorenewal and multiyear renewal options available. Please contact me with any suggestions, complaints, or feedback on the membership renewal process.
To increase membership and involvement in the MSA, it is important to recommend the Society to amateur and professional colleagues, and particularly to students and postdoctoral associates who are interested in fungi. MSA members include pathologists, geneticists, systematists, ecologists, and those people who just want to know more about the fascinating world of fungi. Please help us get the word out! Signing up is easy by following the links on the membership page (https://msafungi.org/join-or-renew/). Please feel free to contact our MSA Membership Coordinator, Cori VanGalder, at (msafungi@reesgroupinc.com) if you have questions about renewing or new memberships.
REMINDER — MSA Directory Update: Have you checked your information in the MSA directory recently? Now is a good time to make sure your address, phone, and email are current. The MSA relies almost entirely on email to bring you timely information on MSA news, awards, elections, meetings, and other activities. To ensure that you receive MSA blast emails and Inoculum, and so your colleagues can keep in touch, please check the accuracy of your contact information in the online directory. This can be accessed via our website (https://msafungi.org/). Look for the membership menu option and drop down to “Member Login”. Once you log in, you will see your profile with options such as “edit profile”, “my directory profile”, and “email subscriptions”. If you need assistance with updating your membership information, please contact our MSA Membership Coordinator, Cori VanGalder, at (msafungi@reesgroupinc.com).
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Please feel free to contact me about MSA business, or any other questions you have about the Society.
Respectfully submitted,
MSA Executive Vice President
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In Memoriam: Dorothy McMeekin |
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Dorothy McMeekin (1932-2020)
"Tall and Strong and Smart"
Written by: J. W. Bennett
Dorothy (“Dot”) McMeekin, Professor Emerita, Department of Botany and Plant Pathology at Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, died in June 2020. She was 88. On hearing the news, one of her former colleagues, Professor Gerry Adams, described her as “Tall and strong and smart.” He got it right.
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MSA News and Announcements |
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Increasing MSA Diversity Via Interchange, Ambassadorship, and Recruitment: an Opportunity to Diversify and Promote Inclusion Throughout our MSA Community
Submitted by: Sara Branco, Geromy Moore, Rebecca Shay, Alisha Quandt, Brian Lovett, and A. Elizabeth Arnold
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Our vibrant and active society includes diverse areas of focus in mycology; from molecules to ecosystems, we study organisms, their building blocks, their history, and their applications from the smallest to the most global scales. This diversity of research foci, coupled with the outstanding teaching, outreach, and service of our membership, truly makes MSA shine.
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Mycological Reading Material
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Please enjoy this list of newly published books available from Koelz, as well as a few other recently published mycological gems.
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Identifiers Wanted: iNaturalist and You!
Submitted by: Else C. Vellinga
So many eyes on the ground: Citizen scientists cover much more ground than any of us can do in a season or lifetime. Not every one of these eager eyes immediately recognizes the importance of its finds or has the resources to identify those beautiful clumps of mushrooms. That is where the scientific community, YOU, professional mycologists, come in and can contribute, educate, and encourage!
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Teaching Mycology Online This Semester or in the Spring?
Submitted by: The MSA Education Committee
Share your materials with our community! Sharing laboratory or lecture activities and content that you have developed for your own mycology course will benefit other MSA members who are being asked to teach online. Help your community! Share today (anonymously, if you prefer) by emailing materials to msaeducation2020@gmail.com.
Thank you in advance for your efforts!
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Neurospora Growth on Pine Wood
Submitted by: Arthur J. Meyers Jr.
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What Type of Fungus Are You?
Submitted by: Adriana L. Romero-Olivares
Dr. Saúl Nava is a Professor of Biology and Life Sciences in the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. Dr. Adriana L. Romero-Olivares collaborated with his Art and Design students on a public engagement/science communication project involving fungi. Dr. Romero-Olivares talked to Dr. Nava's students about different types of fungi and they developed a personality quiz and created a coloring page for your "personality fungus". Here's the link to the personality quiz: http://biomedia-lab.org/flashcollab-fungi.
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The Collection of Zoosporic Eufungi at the University of Michigan (CZEUM): A New Resource Unifying Historically Significant Research Collections
Submitted by: D. Rabern Simmons and Timothy Y. James
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Systematics of the Chytridiomyceta, Blastocladiomycota, and other zoosporic eufungal groups are heavily reliant upon cultured organisms, and the difficulty of their isolation has led only a handful of dedicated, patient researchers to study these fungi. Most of the systematic work on these taxa in the last 40 years was conducted by Joyce E. Longcore at the University of Maine, Martha J. Powell at the University of Alabama, their students, and collaborators. These research groups excelled in culturing these fungi and in training a new generation of zoosporic eufungal researchers, but the maintenance of the cultures has always been a concern, often reliant on soft money provided by outside parties interested in cultures, such as the amphibian pathogen Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, for which the amphibian disease community is reliant for experiments. Additionally, neither the University of Maine nor the University of Alabama currently employs staff that is capable of maintaining the high standard of effort and attention provided by Longcore or Powell.
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Fungal Hollow
Submitted by: Yishai Barak
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Photo taken at Lakeshore Nature Preserve in Madison, Wisconsin. The tree was still alive with green leaves despite being home to plenty of fungi. |
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Renew Your MSA Membership Today!
The time has come to renew your membership with the Mycological Society of America.
Membership with the Society is on a calendar-year basis and the enrollment period for 2021 began on October 1, 2020. MSA offers a wide variety of options for membership. For a complete list and pricing, visit the MSA Membership Information Page.
Emeritus, Lifetime, and Honorary members do not need to renew their membership but if you wish to obtain or adjust your access to Mycologia, you will need to sign into your membership record and complete that process. Please note that Emeritus membership does not include digital access to Mycologia.
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MSA Community Donation Challenge
Donate to the MSA and help your community at the same time!
Participate in an exciting and generous opportunity open to all MSA members. Donate now to any MSA award fund, and MSA benefactors will send a dollar-for-dollar matching donation to the food bank of your choice. This offer is good until the benefactors' total donations of $2,600.00 is committed to community food banks, or January 2021.
How It Works:
- Make a donation of any amount to any of the MSA endowment funds.
- Once a total amount of $2,600.00 in donations has been received, or by January 2021, you will be notified if your donation was made in time to qualify for the matching community donation.
- You will receive a link to a form; complete the form by providing all required information on the IRS-registered, tax exempt food bank of your choice.
- Once your completed form has been verified, MSA will issue a donation to your chosen food bank
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MSA 2021
The 2021 MSA Meeting is scheduled for
July 17 - 21, in Boise, Idaho.
As details become available, they will be communicated to MSA membership via email, and posted on the website. Check back often!
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Thank you to all who have donated to MSA funds since our last publication of Inoculum!
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We Want to See Your Fungal Photos! |
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Your fungal photo could be featured as the header for the next issue of Inoculum!
MSA is calling for your photos! Chosen photos will appear in future issues of Inoculum. Submit your photos along with your name and any text you'd like to accompany the image (optional) using the button below!
The header for this issue of Inoclum was submitted by Michael Fulcher.
Thank you for submitting your photo, Michael!
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The Mycological Society of America | (608) 441-1060 | 2424 American Ln. Madison, WI, 53704 | MSAfungi.org
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