A short history of the European Calcium Society
editThe European Calcium Society is a non-profit society that aims to develop relationships between the different generations of scientists working in the field of Calcium Signal and the proteins involved in it (The Calcium Tool Kit).
The birth in 1989 of the First European Symposium on Calcium Binding Proteins in Normal
and Transformed Cells resulted from a 30 month gestation during which a 4 ingredients
mixture was needed. The 2 first stimulatory ingredients were:
1°) the lack of European Symposia in which young European researchers could participate
(International Symposium was held in Asilomar, CA 1986, in Nagoya in 1988, in Banff,
Canada, etc) and
2°) an EU grant called Stimulation Action that was awarded (to Roland Pochet in Nov 1986.
The 2 last resulted from long discussions Roland Pochet had in 1988 at Saint Odile with Jacques Haiech who point out to the importance European researchers had in calcium binding
proteins (Gabriel Hamoir, Liège 1951, Pechere, Montpellier 1960, etc) and the strong
support received from Claus Heizmann to go on with a symposium. So the “core” of the
four ECS creators (Roland Pochet, Claus Heizmann, Jacques Haiech and Rosario Donato, see
photos) was nearly settled.
1997 was important because was created the ECS under the impulsion of EU, which rejected
a proposal to finance the fourth symposia because lack of structure. So 1997 has seen the
creation of :
1) The first ECS Web site [1]
2) The ECS logo
3) The first newsletter
4) The statutes of the European Calcium Society published in the “Moniteur belge” as an “arrêté royal du 22 septembre 1997” signed by King Albert II.
1998-2005 was a consolidation period. Indeed since 2000, ECS meeting succeeded in being selected as High Level Scientific Conferences by EU allowing to grant young European researchers. The board could be enlarged and gained the valuable and generous competence of Volker Gerke and Steve Moss. ECS then also could provide Posters prizes and recently special grants for young talented researchers.
Since its creation, 30 to 35% of the participants to ECS symposia were young researchers (below 35 years old). Having young researchers as participants has always been one of the main objectives. Another important added value initiated and still headed by Claus Heizmann is the publication since 1992 of the best presentation of articles within the well respected scientific journal BBA.