ADDRESS CORRESPONDENCE TO: Tiffany N. Seagroves, UTHSC Center for Cancer Research, 19 S. Manassas Street, Memphis, Tennessee 38163, USA (E-mail: [email protected]; Phone: 901-448-5018).

Conflict of Interest Statement: There are no conflicts of interest to disclose.

Keywords: shared resources, service center, administration, leadership, ABRF

INTRODUCTION

The planning of the 2022 SEASR annual meeting took into consideration the desire by many scientists and vendors to return to in-person gatherings after travel and social gathering restrictions required the 2021 annual meeting to be held virtually. Although cognizant of the concerns about emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants during early 2022, SEASR felt it was important to host the annual meeting in person since our professional community was suffering from digital fatigue. The excitement surrounding the opportunity to connect with our colleagues in person again led to our 2022 annual meeting theme of “Connect, Collaborate, and Succeed.” Meeting registration to the 9^th annual SEASR meeting remained complimentary for all noncorporate attendees because of the overwhelming support from a variety of academic and corporate sponsors. The annual meeting, held at the Nashville Marriott at Vanderbilt University, was attended by 204 shared resource staff, directors, managers, and administrators. Following premeeting activities and the opening evening keynote presentation on June 8, 2022, the content of the 1.5-day meeting (June 9–10, 2022) included a combination of scientific topics, administrative and leadership sessions, and a poster session. To encourage SEASR annual meeting speakers and attendees to become part of the national Association of Biomolecular Resource Facilities (ABRF), for the first time, all attendees of chapter meetings, like SEASR, were eligible to become ABRF members at no charge throughout the 2022 calendar year. The 2022 SEASR annual meeting program content is hosted on the ABRF website under the “Education & Events” page (https://abrf.memberclicks.net/login#/login). The 10th annual SEASR meeting will be held at the Emory Conference Center Hotel in Atlanta, Georgia, from June 21 to 23, 2023.

PREMEETING ACTIVITIES, JUNE 8, 2022

Professional development workshop

Key components of the mission of ABRF and its affiliated chapters are providing education and promoting professional development for scientists, core administrators, and shared resource staff. Focusing on the needs of early career core facility staff, a premeeting workshop was offered to all meeting registrants that highlighted project management skills as well as resume preparation and interviewing skills.

• “Are you hallucinating? Why solid project management makes a difference” (Vikki Massey, PMP, MSIS, MA, Assistant Vice Chancellor for Information Technology and Deputy CIO, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis, Tennessee): Emphasizing that many projects fail because of poor planning, Ms. Massey spoke about the basics of project management, overviewing the pitfalls of executing a project without a detailed management plan that acknowledges the potential for schedule delays, cost overruns, and an inability to meet the project objectives. She reviewed the critical steps needed to manage a project successfully from the initial preplanning stage to the management of timelines during the project and, finally, at project completion. She identified important soft skills that leaders need to acquire to be a great project manager, and she described how successful project management leads to clearly defined expectations with measurable results. She concluded that effective project management is necessary to meet timelines and to increase efficiency, leading to satisfied customers and project stakeholders.

• “Walk me through your resume” (Gabrielle C. Marshall, Human Resources Employment Consultant, The University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis, Tennessee): Ms. Marshall shared her experience of how recruiters review a resume. She stressed that an excellent resume sells a person’s strongest skills and grabs the attention of employers and recruiters. Ms. Marshall also discussed the differences between a curriculum vitae (CV) and a resume. She provided tips on resume format, verbiage, and font sizes that will grab recruiters’ attention. She then discussed how to prepare for the interview process and how to sell yourself during the interview. She provided several examples of how to best answer the frequently asked question, “Tell me about yourself.” She then spoke about the importance of highlighting interpersonal or soft skills during an interview.

Nashville area core tours

SEASR meeting attendees were also offered the concurrent, premeeting option of visiting local core facilities in Nashville, Tennessee. Facility tours were offered at Vanderbilt University, Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VU and VUMC), and Meharry Medical College (MMC). Participants could choose to tour one or both campuses. The VU/VUMC tour visited 3 cores housed in 2 locations, including the Vanderbilt CryoEM core in the Engineering and Science Building led by Melissa Chambers, the Vanderbilt Flow Cytometry Shared Resource in Medical Center North led by Dave Flaherty, and the Vanderbilt Technologies for Advanced Genomics in Medical Center North led by Angela Jones and Karen Beeri. The MMC tour visited the Harold D. West Basic Sciences Center, where the tour focused on the individual shared equipment housed within a consolidated cores format. Technologies and cores highlighted included the Seahorse metabolic analyzer, the Human Tissue and Pathology Core, and the Consolidated Research Instrumentation, Informatics, Statistics, and Learning Integration Suite (CRISALIS). In the CRISALIS laboratories, instrumentation highlighted included flow cytometers, confocal and super-resolution microscopes, common benchtop equipment, and a BSL-3 laboratory.

OPENING KEYNOTE SESSION AND RECEPTION, JUNE 8, 2022

The SEASR annual meeting opened with a scientific keynote lecture on the evening of June 8, 2022. Dr. James E.K. Hildreth, Sr., PhD, MD, President and CEO of MMC and Professor of Internal Medicine, presented on the topic “COVID-19: How Basic Science Saved the World.” Dr. Hildreth graduated from Harvard University magna cum laude with a BA degree in chemistry, attended Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar and received a PhD in immunology, and then earned an MD from Johns Hopkins University, rising in rank to Assistant Professor in 1987. In 2002, Dr. Hildreth became the first African American in the history of Johns Hopkins School of Medicine to earn full professorship with tenure in the basic sciences. Dr. Hildreth’s research in immunology and virology, focused on HIV, has resulted in more than 130 publications, 11 patents, and multiple NIH grants, including the NIH Director’s Pioneer award. Dr. Hildreth’s expertise led to his appointment to 2 Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisory committees relevant to the COVID-19 pandemic: the Vaccine and Related Biological Products and Antimicrobial Drugs Advisory Committee panels, which review COVID-19 vaccines and drugs, respectively, for FDA approval. In February of 2021, President Biden appointed Dr. Hildreth to the COVID-19 Health Equity Task Force. Dr. Hildreth serves on multiple national advisory boards, including the Advisory Council to the NIH Director, the board of the Association of Academic Health Centers, and the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences.

In the keynote session, Dr. Hildreth reviewed the biology of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and its receptor (ACE), COVID-19 disease phenotypes, the history of the pandemic, and the impact of health disparities observed during the pandemic. He showed several examples of how basic science directly contributed to reducing deaths during the pandemic, highlighting advances in vaccine development, antiviral drugs, monoclonal antibody research, and rapid diagnostics. He concluded his presentation with a variety of examples of research areas that were awarded a Nobel Prize from 1965 to 1993 that facilitated the rapid response to the pandemic, including the identification of DNA structure, genome sequencing methods, genetic control of enzyme and virus synthesis (mRNA), immumoglobular domain structure, principles of monoclonal antibody use for molecular medicine, and PCR. These examples were used to dispel a perception in the lay community that the development of COVID-19 vaccines was rushed. The opening reception followed, with live entertainment provided by The Cowpokes, a country and western band from the Nashville area (Figure 1).

JUNE 9, 2022, PROGRAM

Welcome and opening remarks

• Welcome and opening remarks (Tiffany Seagroves, PhD, MBA, Associate Vice Chancellor for Research, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis, Tennessee): SEASR President Dr. Tiffany Seagroves officially opened the meeting with a welcoming address. She thanked the annual meeting sponsors and provided a history of SEASR and its mission. She introduced the SEASR 2022 Organizing Committee (OC) members and acknowledged Ms. Finesha Colton-Lee (Emory University), the past treasurer, for her years of SEASR service. She also thanked Ms. Kristen Massey (University of Tennessee, Knoxville) for her assistance with SEASR newsletters, Dr. Shawn Goodwin of MMC for his support organizing MMC core tours, and Ms. Susan Meyn (VUMC) for her service on the SEASR external advisory board. Meeting logistics and details of the exhibit hall raffle prize were announced.

• Highlights of ABRF initiatives and benefits of ABRF membership (Ken Schoppmann, CAE, IOM, Executive Director, ABRF): Ken Schoppmann briefed the attendees on the mission of ABRF, the organization’s goals, and ABRF membership benefits. He stressed that ABRF strives to promote best practices and scientific excellence by focusing on 4 main goals: 1) building a diverse, inclusive collaborative community; 2) promoting collaboration and advancing professional relationships; 3) recognizing scientific expertise and institutions that model best practices; and 4) providing resources to improve fiscal sustainability. To achieve these objectives, ABRF provides educational support, provides opportunities for professional development, and sponsors multisite research group studies. The research groups sponsored by ABRF have developed a framework to promote technology and to share best practices, which results in poster presentations and publications. Mr. Schoppmann also announced that, for the first time, all ABRF chapter meeting attendees would receive complimentary membership for ABRF through the end of 2022. This program was piloted for SEASR and will be implemented for all chapters going forward.

Keynote lectures

• Computational imaging of the cellular microenvironment (Kevin Eliceiri, PhD, RRF, Walter H. Helmerich Professor of Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Morgridge Institute for Research, Madison, Wisconsin): Dr. Eliceiri presented his work on the collagen-rich extracellular matrix (ECM) and its implication as a prognostic factor for breast and pancreatic cancers. He highlighted how analysis of data from 2-photon microscopy using convolutional neural networks (“deep learning”) has impacted disease diagnosis and prognosis.

• Targeted therapeutics for metastatic cancers using patient-derived materials (Suranganie Dharmawardhane Flanagan, PhD, Professor of Biochemistry, School of Medicine, University of Puerto Rico Medical Sciences Campus, San Juan, Puerto Rico): Dr. Dharmawardhane Flanagan presented her work on the development of therapeutics to inhibit metastasis of cancer cells. Her talk focused on the inhibition of Rac1/CDC42 activation; this pathway regulates actin cytoskeleton rearrangement, thereby controlling cell migration. Rac1 and CDC42 are associated with metastatic efficiency and are known risk factors in patient survival from breast and pancreatic cancers. The small molecule MBQ-167, developed to inhibit Rac1/CDC42 activation, demonstrated efficacy against patient- derived tissues in both organoid culture in vitro and when transplanted into humanized mice. MBQ-167 has recently been approved for use in phase 1 clinical trials.

Breakout session I

Scientific track: high-dimensional data analysis in cores

• Supporting data science and automating analysis: cytometry examples from Vanderbilt’s Cancer & Immunology Core (Jonathan Irish, PhD, Associate Professor of Cell & Developmental Biology, Associate Professor of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology, Scientific Director, Cancer & Immunology Core and Scientific Director, Mass Cytometry Center of Excellence, Vanderbilt School of Medicine, Nashville, Tennessee): As an “early adopter” of mass cytometry, Dr. Irish shared his experiences transitioning a highly complex “niche instrument” into a shared resource. Since developing 35+ antibody panels is an expensive and time-consuming process, he offered users an annual usage license model to lower total run service costs. When working with high dimensional panels, traditional manual cytometry analysis is incapable of revealing all possible cell relationships; therefore, the core also focused on the development of and utilization of machine learning analysis tools, such as RAPID and TREX, and then provided data analysis as a fee for service. The core continues to operate with the goal of providing the best data analysis tools. Core staff routinely compare new platforms to those currently in use, and the apps optimized by core staff allow users to learn how to use data analysis tools by querying known datasets.

• Combination of multi-omics multi-platform approaches to gain insights in mechanisms of pathobiology in academic cores (Carsten Krieg, PhD, Assistant Professor, Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, South Carolina): Dr. Krieg began his presentation by describing how cores walk a tight financial line between institutional administrators and the investigators that they serve. For example, core directors are often charged with recovering the cost of an instrument within 5 years while charging fees for services that do not generate a profit. Core directors must also address the needs of investigators, who demand the least expensive solutions that make use of the latest and greatest technologies to generate exciting data. To meet these challenges, Dr. Krieg’s approach is to provide services to as many groups as possible by offering panel development and expanding protocols for different tissue types, including frozen tissues. He also stressed the importance of core staff being involved in the design of the project during the planning stages to better anticipate or to proactively eliminate data artifacts and to determine if a multi-pronged approach would be best for a project, such as combining cellular indexing of transcriptomes and epitopes by RNA-seq and mass cytometry. The success of his facility was demonstrated by presenting several key projects such as evaluating the safety and efficacy of immune therapeutics in longitudinal studies, identifying key cell types responsible for reducing tumor size, deciding on a course of treatment, or validating pathology findings. Among the early adopters nationwide to offer mass cytometry services within a core facility, Dr. Krieg concluded that high-dimensional data analysis should begin with no more than 12 to 15 markers, the core should be involved in pre-experiment planning, and the core should be a strong proponent of how technology can advance research. He also stressed that communication is key; all core staff should be effective communicators and collaborate with investigators and other core facilities.

Administrative track: leadership training, including conflict resolution

• Leadership self-awareness (Melody Johnson, EMBA, Training Manager, Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia): Ms. Johnson’s session focused on understanding one’s personality and the personality of others to help leaders better manage conflicts that arise among different leadership and staff positions within shared resources. This was an interactive session, which started with a self-assessment of the participants’ own DISC (dominance, influence, steadiness, conscientious) profile followed by the analysis of the pros and cons of each DISC personality type. Afterward, Ms. Johnson facilitated a discussion wherein session participants discussed their personal challenges and coping mechanisms when interacting with managers/mentees/co-workers of different personality styles.

Breakout session II, June 9, 2022

Scientific track: panel discussion

• Genomics instrumentation breakout session—an expert panel discussion (Angela Jones and Karen Beeri, Genomics Core, VUMC, Nashville, Tennessee; Scott Olsen, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee; Dr. Kathryn Pellegrini, Yerkes Genomics Core, Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia): The panelists discussed 2 major areas relevant to genomics cores: Laboratory Information Management Systems (LIMS) systems for tracking samples and the automation of instrumentation. Each panelist introduced their core, including the systems their core housed, and then provided a brief description of how the systems were utilized. Most of the cores represented by the panel rely on either custom LIMS systems or systems built out of existing platforms, such as the BaseSpace Clarity LIMS system. It was discussed that there are currently no clear cut or easy solutions for those facilities trying to develop LIMS systems with no access to an existing platform. One conclusion was that it would be beneficial for vendors to develop and to offer affordable LIMS systems that could support sample intake for new core facilities.

The panelists noted a diverse list of automation hardware used to prepare samples (Agilent Bravo, SPT Labtech Mosquito, Opentrons OT-2, Kingfisher FLEX, Qiagen Qiacube, PerkinElmer Sciclone NGSx, Hamilton STAR, Hamilton Nimbus, and Biomek instruments). Each instrument’s software and setup complexity were discussed, and it was concluded that some instruments are more difficult to program than others and that some instruments require repairs by a field applications specialist as opposed to core staff troubleshooting via a phone call to the vendor. Advice regarding the purchase of a new instrument was also discussed, such as inclusion of the assays the core wants to develop into the contract and listing the necessary training opportunities into the contract. The development of new protocols as well as the optimization of automated protocols was also discussed.

Overall, it was recommended that new protocols are best performed manually at first since this approach allows core staff to program steps into the automation software with consideration to particular pipetting procedures that might require oversight (for example, the awareness of the optimal programming of pipet speed for a viscous solution). The session gave an opportunity for all attendees to network with representatives from the 3 cores who all have experience with LIMS and automation systems and provided contact information to seek future feedback on these topics.

Administrative track: setting core service pricing

• What’s price got to do with IT? (Natasha Browner, PhD, Director of Laboratory Services and Research Resources, Office of Sponsored Research Administration, Morehouse School of Medicine, Atlanta, Georgia): Dr. Browner reviewed how to perform a needs assessment to justify establishing a core and how to develop a business and administrative plan. She also explained the allowable costs that should factor into a service fee rate, how to create a budget forecast, and the importance of annual financial reports. Dr. Browner provided examples of rate setting that seemed logical but were, in fact, not compliant with the federal Office of Management and Budget under “Uniform Administrative Requirements, Cost Principles, and Audit Requirements for Federal Awards” (2 CFR part 200).

Breakout session III, June 9, 2022

Scientific track: collaborations between cores and centers

• Collaborative cancer research: the intersection between the Innovative Translational Research Shared Resource (ITR) and the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center (VICC) (Kimberly Brown Dahlman, PhD, Associate Professor of Medicine, Division of Hematology/Oncology, Vanderbilt University Medical Center and Director, ITR, VICC, Nashville, Tennessee): Dr. Dahlman described how the core facility she directs (the ITR) bridges the gap between clinical and basic research by assisting investigators with project planning, budgeting, and collaborating with other shared resource laboratories. She conveyed the benefits of being an National Cancer Institute (NCI) Center–supported core within the VICC, which provides access to additional administration support, budgetary support to fund new technologies, and simpler access to NIH grant funding, such as through the National Cancer Institute Research Specialist (R50) award mechanism, which is well suited for core-based scientists. The VICC further promotes collaboration by awarding scholarships to investigators for use in the core facilities, which gives the core an automatic customer base.

• Serving a mission: core facilities in centers and institutes (Jon Phipps, PhD, former Executive Director, Institute for Advanced Materials and Manufacturing at University of Tennessee, Knoxville and Director, University of Tennessee, Knoxville Core Facilities, Knoxville, Tennessee): Dr. Phipps discussed how core facilities are a critical piece of the infrastructure that allows institutes to align and to mobilize large groups of faculty in a common direction. Through the support provided by staff scientists and by providing access to cutting-edge equipment, researchers will not only amplify their own work but will also find a common space to build new collaborations. Likewise, core facilities benefit from being housed within an institute, as this type of administrative structure streamlines the administration of the facilities while allowing the leadership to address needs more quickly without involving multiple departments in the decision-making process. This structure results in an ecosystem that benefits the university, its faculty, and shared resource facilities in a way that traditional organizational models (either centralized or de-centralized) often struggle to accomplish.  

Administrative track: transitioning from core staff to core director or administration: experiences on the Vanderbilt Campus

• From core manager to assistant dean: embracing and mastering the difficult and unwanted tasks (Anthony Tharp, PhD, Assistant Dean for Facilities, Infrastructure and Risk Management, Vanderbilt School of Medicine, Basic Sciences, Nashville, Tennessee): Dr. Tharp shared his career path through scientific research and administration, ranging from industry work, core facility management, and administrative and facility leadership. He emphasized building skills by learning how to master tasks that others typically otherwise avoid (“unwanted tasks”). He credits his success to keeping an open mind, actively searching for unmet needs at the institution, and making a measurable difference in operational organizational effectiveness and efficiency.

• Becoming a research administrator: a career perspective (Susan Meyn, Senior Director, Office of Research, VUMC, Nashville, Tennessee): Ms. Meyn began her presentation with how she came to love basic science research and how she transitioned her project and personnel management skills to core administration. She credited the impact of strong mentors throughout her career and noted how big changes also brought big opportunities, both throughout her career and within her home institution.

• From staff to director: establishing yourself to advance in a core facility (Josh Bauer, PhD, High Throughput Screening Facility, and Director, Functional Genomics Screening & High-Content Imaging, Vanderbilt Institute of Chemical Biology, Nashville, Tennessee): Dr. Bauer detailed his move from the traditional academic path over to core staff and then to director as he followed his interests in cancer research and advancing new technologies. He reflected that his ongoing success was attributed to developing new tools to address unmet needs, active learning on the job, staying connected to research colleagues, and engaging with vendors and professional societies.

Poster session, June 9, 2022

The poster session included 18 total posters, hosting 8 posters from academic core facilities and 10 posters submitted by vendors. Yi Lasanajak, MS, MSPH, Technical Director of the Emory University Glycomics and Molecular Interactions Core received the best poster award.

Breakout session IV, June 10, 2022

Scientific track: collaborations between cores and researchers: pilot project outcomes

• Bridging gaps in genomics research (Anil Shanker, PhD, Professor of Biochemistry, Cancer Biology and Neuroscience and Pharmacology, Senior Vice President for Research and Innovation, MMC, Nashville, Tennessee): Dr. Shanker delivered thought-provoking insight into how genomics research has led to healthcare inequality and what is needed to help achieve health equity. He spoke about how personalized genetic information is used for diagnosis and treatment and how drug efficacy is based upon European ancestry that is predominantly curated in the largest publicly available genomic databases. He discussed the need for more research into the genomics of diverse ancestries to account for inherited genetic variations among populations. With as few as 20 medical/clinical geneticists and less that 2% of all genetic counselors represented by black scientists nationwide, Dr. Shanker also discussed the need to encourage more diversity in research to overcome issues such as community distrust and to promote health equity in the United States.

• VICTR resource request funding program overview (Lesa Black, PhD, Research Services Consultant, Vanderbilt Institute for Clinical and Translational Research, VICTR, VUMC Nashville, Tennessee): Dr. Black shared information about various funding mechanisms for pilot projects offered through the VICTR program at Vanderbilt. VICTR supports those clinical or translational pilot projects for which outcomes can be directly related to the diagnosis or treatment of human disease or will improve health outcomes and involve human subjects or human-derived material. Funding is available for up to 3 years for students, fellows, and faculty of VUMC or MMC, and a high percentage of funds are awarded to early career investigators. Funds can be used to access clinical research support teams, core laboratory services, and/or research supplies. Applications undergo scientific peer review, but the depth of the review depends upon the amount of requested support.

Administrative track: managing your team: leadership and diversity in the workforce

• Diversity and inclusion moments: across the workforce, workplace and marketplace (Michael Alston, EdD, CCDP-AP, CAHRI, Associate Vice Chancellor for Inclusion, Equity and Diversity, Chief Diversity Officer, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis, Tennessee): Dr. Alston presented on the issues of diversity and inclusion, beginning by asking the audience to brainstorm about the meaning of each word. He then formally defined each concept. He stressed that for diversity, the “primary” dimensions, or the areas we often think of first, such as gender, race, age, culture, ethnicity, etc., also include “secondary” dimensions (values, education, language, geography, working style, relationship status, and belief systems) and beyond, to include organizational, institutional, and contemporary influences (the “era,” for example, #MeToo, COVID-19 pandemic, current politics, and world events). The benefits of a diverse workforce were discussed. Various examples of diversity and inclusion “wins” and “failures” were shown in the context of the workplace and in the marketplace. He reminded session participants that the workplace culture directly impacts employee retention by reviewing the various type of biases and microaggressions that have been demonstrated to decrease organizational effectiveness. He then challenged the audience to consider diversity across the workforce (people), the workplace (culture), and the marketplace (the business environment) and to question how well our own organization embodies the principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) within these contexts.

• Working with difficult people: is it you or me? (Sherrie Lynn, Lead Organizational Development Consultant, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee): Mrs. Lynn spoke about emotional intelligence and its importance in influencing others and enhancing relationships at work and at home. She also discussed how to adjust your own communication and leadership styles based on the preferences of others.

Breakout session V, June 10, 2022

Scientific track: short talks selected from submitted poster abstracts

In recognition of the important and exciting work ongoing within the SEASR community, the SEASR OC selected 3 submitted poster abstracts for a short talk and concurrent consideration for a travel award (available to presenters outside of the metropolitan Nashville, Tennessee, area).

• A closed loop feature detection platform for automated neonate cardio–respiratory measurements and data analysis (Christopher Scott Ward, PhD, Assistant Professor, Department of Integrative Physiology and Director of the Mouse Metabolism and Phenotyping Core, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas): Dr. Ward was the recipient of a 2022 SEASR travel award. Dr. Ward discussed how the perturbation of the auto-resuscitation reflex in infants is a reason for sudden infant death syndrome. His work described the development of an automated platform to model auto-resuscitation in mice for the rapid collection of research data.

• Supporting shared instrumentation grants: from RFA to AUR (and beyond)! (Amy F. Martinez, PhD, Scientific Program Officer, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, Tennessee): Dr Martinez shared her insights on shared equipment grants and the NIH S10 grant program. She described the stages of the grant life cycle from planning to submitting a grant proposal to notice of award, equipment implementation, and required award reporting.

• Spatial immunophenotyping using the PhenoCycler platform at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center Immunophenotyping Shared Resource (Jamye F. O’Neal, Scientific Research Core Facility Manager, Innovative Translational Research Shared Resource, Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, Nashville, Tennessee): Dr. O’Neal described the use of the PhenoCycler system (formerly known as CODEX) for spatial immunophenotyping and the technology behind the system.

Administrative track: speed mentoring

• Speed mentoring for career advancement (Nawal Boukli, PhD, Professor of Microbiology and Immunology; Director, Biomedical Proteomics Facility, Central Caribbean University Medical School, Puerto Rico): The purpose of the speed mentoring session was to provide an informal venue where early career and junior level personnel could receive advice from senior members of their profession. At the event, mentees participated in 10 rounds of 5-minute interaction times with a mentor. In total, 14 mentors were able to pass on experiences to over 30 mentees.

CORPORATE PARTNER SESSIONS

In addition to their participation in the vendor hall, select SEASR corporate partners presented their newest technologies to meeting attendees throughout the meeting during sponsor spotlight presentations followed by time for Q&A:

• “Extending the reach of illumina sequencing platforms” (Illumina)

• “Adaptive focused acoustics enabling confident data in multi-omics research” (Covaris)

• “Low-input ultraplexed RNA-seq library kits with integrated ribosomal RNA removal” (Qiagen)

• “New tools enabling advances in cancer genomic research” (Twist)

CLOSING REMARKS

The SEASR annual meeting program ended with closing remarks from the incoming SEASR President, Pritha Bagchi, PhD of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. She introduced the SEASR executive board members who will serve during the 2022 to 2023 term (Figure 2). She also announced the venue for the 2023 SEASR annual meeting, which will be the Emory Conference Center Hotel in Atlanta from June 21 to 23, 2023. Registration for this meeting is expected to open in March of 2023.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The SEASR Executive Board wishes to thank all of the 2022 sponsors for making the annual meeting event possible: Covaris, Inc., Illumina, Qiagen, LLC, Twist Bioscience, 10X Genomics, Agilent, NanoString Technologies, Intelligent Imaging Innovations, Applied Scientific Instrumentation, Bionano Genomics, Inc., Fluidigm, Integrated DNA Technologies, Laboratory Corporation of America, Lexogen, Inc., Parse Biosciences, PacBio, Takara Bio USA, Adaptive Biotechnologies, Beckman Coulter Life Sciences, BMG Labtech, Fluent Biosciences, Gator Bio, Hamilton Company, Oxford Nanopore Technologies, NanoTemper Technologies, Nikon Instruments, Inc., Roche Diagnostics Corporation, seqWell, Stratocore, Inc., Specialty Underwriters LLC, Thermo Fisher Scientific, TwinStrand Biosciences, Morehouse School of Medicine, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, St Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Meharry Medical College, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Augusta University, Emory University, and Vanderbilt University Medical Center. The Executive Board would also like to thank the SEASR external advisory board members (Ms. Susan Meyn and Dr. Michael Zwick). We also thank all the other regional ABRF chapters for providing input about meeting logistics and organization. The Board would also like to thank Kevin Knudtson, PhD (ABRF President, University of Iowa), the ABRF Executive Board, and the AMR Event Management Solutions staff for their support of SEASR and for assisting with meeting planning and logistics.