Microbe Post: a message from the President
Posted on March 12, 2025 by Professor Gordon Dougan, FRS
Professor Gordon Dougan, FRS, President of the Microbiology Society, looks forward to his first Annual Conference as President and reflects on his first few weeks in the role.
First of all, it is a great honour to be elected as President of the Microbiology Society, following in the unfillable footprints of people like Alexander Fleming. I will be attending my first Annual Conference in Liverpool as President and look forward to meeting people there and listening to your views and the science. I have now been in position for a few weeks, and I am beginning to understand the role and the challenges we face. Our Society is one of the largest of its kind in the world with significant UK and global representation. Thus, we are in a position where we can influence constructively.
Like everyone in this rapidly changing world, we face significant challenges and some of these have to be a priority. One is that the Society is currently running a deficit. Although this is manageable in the shorter term it needs tackling. Consequently, I have been spending time with the Society staff and various members, exploring options of how to reduce this and bring us into a sustainable position. We will keep you updated as we progress.
We have made changes to the Annual Conference. This meeting has become a cornerstone of the Society and many of us love attending and taking the opportunity to meet old friends and make new connections. Some will even be presenting their very first talk, just as I did as a PhD student at Imperial College, back before many of you were born. I still remember how nervous I was! It is important that members attending (and those not attending) give us feedback on the pros and cons of these changes. It is your Society, and we will listen. In the end, this all links back into creating a sustainable Society. We have a chance to make changes, but these has to be planned well in advance.
I have been visiting the Society’s offices in Islington, London. I go there every couple of weeks so I can get to know the staff. I must say, it has been a real pleasure meeting and working with such a talented team. We are starting to discuss ways forward, for example on our links with industry that need strengthening and our publishing business. More of that in a later blog.
I do like the Society head office. We held a productive meeting there in February on AMR and vaccines attended by around 30 people, including leading figures in the field. We held fruitful discussions and will prepare a report for publication in our journals. We are considering holding more meetings there as they can be cost effective and a chance for staff and members to meet. Perhaps we could run training courses there.
The governance structure of the Society has been changed to incorporate a streamlined Board of Trustees. We held our first meeting recently and got down to business, discussing the Society’s finances and publishing plans. It felt a bit like a Board of Management to me. We now need to align the Trustees, the Advisory Council and the Committees, to ensure we have shared priorities. Through this we can create a common strategy. Remember, joining these groups is an election-based process open to all members.
On a personal note, even though I am now Emeritus at Cambridge University, I still have an office there and work closely with various teams at the research end. I am deputy Director of a Stem Cell Institute in Hong Kong, where I provide input into using stem cells to study infection and immunity. The science there is fascinating. I am on the Board of Management of the Hilleman Laboratories, based in Singapore. This is a joint Wellcome-Merck company to create affordable vaccines. Our current projects cover vaccines for Ebola, Cholera, Mumps, Lassa and Influenza to name a few. I am currently a Trustee of the International Vaccine Institute based in South Korea but with sites across the world. This is an international organisation with a mission to build infrastructure and knowhow for affordable vaccine deployment. These are all part-time positions that keep me in touch with people.
Finally, I have returned to teaching. I am currently volunteering to lecture biomedical degree students in my hometown of Scunthorpe. This is at the University Campus North Lincolnshire, working closely with Hull University. It is rewarding to meet people from different backgrounds with a common aim to better themselves through education.
If time permits, I will be sending out similar blogs periodically covering different topics during my tenure. In the meantime, any ideas of suggestions on how to develop our Society are welcome.
Professor Gordon Dougan, FRS
President of the Microbiology Society