Minutes of the ECA Council, Leuven, 2006

Minutes of the Meeting of the Council held in Leuven on 7 and 9 August 2006, during the 23^rd European Crystallographic Meeting.

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Those present: day(s) present

Member-Countries, Councillors or Proxies: [ ] = not present p: = proxy

Dz	Algeria		Guehria Laidoudi	\|__7__9
At	Austria		Ekkehart Tillmanns	\|__7__9
Be	Belgium		Luc Van Meervelt	\|__7__9
Bg	Bulgaria		Kostadin Petrov	\|______
Hr	Croatia		[Stanko Popovic] p: Dalibor MIlic	\|__7__9
Cz	Czech + Slovak		Jindrich Hasek	\|__7__9
Dk	Denmark		[Robert Feidenhans'l] p: Sine Larsen p: Kenny Stahl	\|__7___ \|_____9
Eg	Egypt		Karimat El Sayed	\|__7__9
Fi	Finland		[Keijo Hämäläinen] p: Merja Blomberg	\|__7__9
Fr	France		Jean-Louis Hodeau	\|__7__9
De	Germany		Wolfgang Neumann	\|__7__9
Gr	Greece		[Irene Mavridis] p: Emmanuel Saridakis	\|__7__9
Hu	Hungary		Alajos Kalman	\|__7__9
Il	Israel		[Israel Goldberg]	\|______
It	Italy		Paola Spadon	\|__7__9
Lv	Latvia		Anatolij Mishnev	\|__7__9
Ma	Morocco		Abdelmalek Thalal	\|__7__9
Nl	Netherlands		Piet Gros p: A.L. Spek	\|_____9 \|__7___
No	Norway		Carl Henrik Gørbitz	\|__7__9
Pl	Poland		Adam Pietraszko p: Marek Glowka	\|__7___ \|_____9
Pt	Portugal		[Ana Margarida Damas] p: Teresa Duarte	\|__7__9
Su	Russia		Svetlana Zheludeva	\|__7__9
Yu	Serbia		[Slobodanka Stankovic] p: Olivia Klisuric	\|__7__9
Si	Slovenia		[Ivan Leban] p: Nina Lah	\|__7__9
Za	South Africa		[Susan Bourne] p: Mino Caira	\|__7__9
Es	Spain		Enrique Gutierrez-Puebla	\|__7__9
Se	Sweden		Ylva Lindqvist	\|__7__9
Ch	Switzerland		Jürg Schefer	\|__7__9
Tn	Tunisia		Mongi Debbabi	\|______
Tr	Turkey		Yalcin Elerman	\|__7__9
Uk	UK		Christine Cardin p: Katherine Mccauley	\|_____9 \|__7___
Ua	Ukraine		Anatoliy Senyshyn	\|__7__9
	IM1		Teresa Borowiak	\|__7__9
	IM2		Massimo Nespolo	\|__7__9
			Quorum count: Total	31 31

	Observers:
	IUCr		Chris Gilmore	\|__7__9
	Armenia		Siranush Bezirganyan	\|__7__9

SIG's representatives:
	SIG.1		Anders Liljas	\|__7__9
	SIG.2		Heinz Graafsma	\|______
	SIG.3		Gervais Chapuis	\|__7__9
	SIG.4		Thomas Weirich	\|__7___
	SIG.5		Wulf Depmeier	\|__7__9
	SIG.6		Jean-Louis Hodeau	\|__7__9
	SIG.7		Paola Gilli	\|__7__9
	SIG.8		Jordi Rius	\|__7__9
	SIG.9		Antony L. Spek	\|__7__9
	SIG.10		Svetlana Zheludeva	\|__7__9
	SIG.11		Alain Polian	\|__7__9
	SIG.12		Pamela Thomas	\|_____9
	SIG.13		Chick C. Wilson	\|__7__9

ECM's representatives:

	ECM-23	Luc van Meervelt, Harry Reynaers, Bernard Tinant		\|__7__9
	ECM-24	Abdelmalek Thalal		\|__7__9

Executive Committee (EC):
	President		Hartmut Fuess	\|__7__9
	Vice-President		Mariusz Jaskolski	\|__7__9
	Past-President		Claude Lecomte	\|__7__9
	Secretary		Giuseppe Filippini	\|__7__9
	Treasurer		Teresa Duarte	\|__7__9
	Members		Anders Liljas	\|__7__9
			Andreas Roodt	\|__7__9
			Chick C. Wilson	\|__7__9

ECANEWS webmaster			Massimo Nespolo	\|__7__9


Also present:			Petra Bombicz	\|__7__9
			Robert Cernik	\|_____9
			Eleanor Dodson	\|_____9
			Herta S. Effenberger	\|__7__9
			Santiago Garcia-Granda	\|__7__9
			John R. Helliwell	\|__7__9
			Engin Kendi (future ECM’s)	\|__7__9
			Radomir Kuzel	\|__7__9
			Sine Larsen	\|_____9
			Carlo Mealli	\|__7__9
			Frank van Meurs	\|__7__9

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The proposed agenda and most of the reports have been distributed by e-mail circulars (April 11: Preliminary notice; May 11: Agenda, Proposal for voting procedure of IMs’ representatives, Proposals for EC officers; June 9: SIG-1, -2, -4, -5, -9 reports; July 13: Proposals for EC ordinary members; July 18 President’s report, SIG-8, -10,reports; July 27: SIG-3 report; July 28: SIG-11, -13 reports; July 31: Treasurer's and SIG-6 reports; August 1: SIG-7 report).

The ECA President, Professor Hartmut Fuess, was in the chair.

First session: 7 August

Opening

1.1 Welcome to Council and Guests

The Chairman welcomed the Councillors, the observers and the guests.

1.2 Application for membership

The Secretary informed that no applications have been received.

The President introduced the observer from Armenia and invited her to say a few words. Dr Bezirganyan reported briefly on the situation of crystallography in her Country and thanked the EC and the Council for the opportunity of attending the meeting.

Contacts with potential members of the ECA have been planned, with the presence of members of the EC at the national meetings.

News and information from the Executive Committee.

1.3.1 Max Perutz Prize

The Prize has been given, during the Opening Ceremony, to Eleanor Dodson, “for developing, implementing, teaching and applying the best tools available to produce macromolecular structures of highest quality”.

1.3.2 Felix Bertaut Prize

The foundation of the Prize in cooperation with the European Neutron Scattering Association (ENSA) was announced for young scientists under 35. Crystallographers and neutron diffraction researchers will receive the prize in a sequence to be defined. The first award will be distributed during the ENSA meeting at Lund in July 2007.

1.3.3 ECANEWS

The President thanked the webmaster, Professor Massimo Nespolo, for his dedicated contribution in improving the site. Professor Nespolo stressed that every Country should have a responsible liaison in order to speed up the flow of information. As a start the Councillors themselves will act in this office. Links with the National and SIGs’ websites will be further implemented.

Former e-mail decisions

No decisions were taken by e-mail between the Council in Firenze and the present one in Leuven.

3. Annual Reports by the Executive Committee (Aug. 2005 - 31 Dec. 2005)and preliminary progress reports (up to Aug. 2006)

3.1 Report by the President

Professor Fuess referred to his report sent to all Councillors(enclosed).

3.2 Report by the Vice-President on sponsorship of meeting and schools.

During the term 2003-2006, the main activities of the Vice President were focused (i) on coordination of the ECA program to support crystallographic schools and conferences, and (ii) on attempts to establish contacts with new national members.

Ad (i): A set of rules have been worked out for supporting the participation of young scientists in crystallographic schools and conferences. Those rules were discussed during ECA Council Meetings and are enclosed as a document entitled "Operational guidelines for supporting European workshops, schools, and conferences on crystallography by ECA". These Guidelines have been used to evaluate applications for support, to disburse the funds, and to collect reports. Overall, 14 meetings were supported for the total amount of 18000 Euros (2004: 3 meetings, 4000 Euros; 2005: 5 meetings, 7000 Euros; 2006: 6 meetings, 7000 Euros). At the time of the ECA Council Meeting in Leuven, reports from organizers of all closed meetings have been obtained. They are available from the Vice President on request. A summary of all grants awarded during the term 2003-2006 is enclosed.

Ad (ii): Letters have been sent to the crystallographic communities in Romania, Belarus, and Lithuania. As a result, an observer from Belarus attended the ECA Council Meeting in Budapest, August 2004.

3.3 Report by the Secretary

Dr Filippini thanked the Councillors for many fruitful contacts during the six years of office and pointed out some aspects which may be overcome only with their help. The more the Association is growing, the more the Secretary needs the help of everybody to keep the pace with the dissemination of the information. And this is particularly needed when a new Secretary takes office.

3.4 Report by the Treasurer

Professor Duarte reported on the budget. Sending on time annual invoices to the Councillors improved the payments.

The situation of the budget is fine, and will even improve if the ECM’s organizers will continue to give some money to the ECA, as it has been done so far by the organizers of Nancy and Budapest ECM’s.

Dr Kuzel reported on the IM's fees collection which resulted in more than 200 regular members. The five-year fee (€ 50), decided in order to simplify the procedures and save money, seems to work both by credit card payments and money transfer.

4. Approval by the Council of the submitted accounts (re 3.3)

One of the auditors, Professor Garcia-Granda, read the report with approval.

The Councillors approved the audited accounts for 2005.

4.1 Auditors for 2006

No decision has been taken. Proposals will be put forward by the new EC and approved by the Councillors according to the TVP.

Pre 7. Elections for President and other Officers

At the Chairman’s request, the Council agreed to listen to the statements of all the candidates for the new Executive Committee.

Professors Helliwell, Larsen, Kuzel, Effenberger, Garcia-Granda, Roodt, van Meervelt, Wilson and Doctors Bombicz and Mealli said a few words on their aims and wishes should they be elected.

5. Reports regarding SIG's

5.1 SIG.1 Macromolecular Crystallography