Peter Jezzard, Ph.D. 2013-14 ISMRM President

Welcome to the first MR Pulse Newsletter of the 2013/2014 year. I am sure that you all are aware of our Annual Scientific Meeting as a venue for scientific networking and for learning about the latest developments in our vibrant field. But are you aware of all the other activities that ISMRM provides over the course of the year? I particularly wanted to focus on two of the newer initiatives that are available to you and that I think will enrich your scientific lives. One is the Virtual Journal Club (VJC) that is already entering its third year. Mark Griswold has provided a superlative service as Master of Ceremonies for the VJC, that has discussed a range of topics spanning compressed sensing to hyperpolarized tracers to the ‘gagetron’ simulation environment.

         ISMRM now has a 500-seat licence with Adobe Connect to offer this service, so you should henceforth never have a problem joining the online conversation, especially if you use the VJC events as a group educational experience, as we do in Oxford. And if you do miss a VJC event then you can find them in the ISMRM archive. These truly are an outstanding opportunity for you to learn about the latest trends in our field by discussing the papers of experts in the field with the authors themselves.
         Another exciting innovation is the concept of the Virtual Study Group Meeting that has recently launched. Several Study Groups already have virtual meetings lined up over the coming months and I hope there will be many more. If you have an idea for a Virtual Study Group Meeting then you should suggest it to your Study Group’s leaders. I envisage these meetings taking a wide variety of forms, including ‘mini workshops’, panel discussions, and consensus-building meetings. But the only real limit to the format is your imagination for how to make best use of this Society resource. Again, we can have up to 500 simultaneous participants (and many more if people sit in the same room to connect on the day). So hopefully you should never have a problem in joining any events that you wish to. Although, clearly priority will be given to members of the Study Group organizing the event.
          So my main message in this edition of MR Pulse is to participate in ISMRM’s Virtual Meeting events, and to gain access year-round to the fantastic global scientific community that ISMRM represents! To see the forthcoming events please visit http://www.ismrm.org/virtual-meetings