Biophysical Society Bulletin | April 2021

April 2021

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BPS Appoints NewBJ Editor-in-Chief

The Biophysical Society is pleased to announce Vasanthi Jayaraman will be the next Editor-in-Chief of Biophysical Journal beginning January 1, 2022. She will succeed the current Editor-in-Chief, Jane Dyson , whose 5-year term ends in December 2021. Together they will work to seat the 2022 Editorial Board. “The Biophysical Journal and the Biophysical Society have been definitional to my career,” said Jayaraman. “It is my honor to be the Editor-in-Chief for the journal. I look forward to continue to showcase the best research in biophysics and further strengthen the connections between the Society and the journal.” Jayaraman is a professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, McGovern Medical School, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, where she works on studying function and dynamics of membrane proteins using spectroscopy and single-molecule imaging methods. She received her PhD from Princeton and did her postdoctoral work at Cornell University. No stranger to Editorial Boards, Jayaraman has been serving as an Associate Editor for the Channels and Transporters Section of BJ since 2019 and before that was an Editorial Board Member from 2016 to 2018. She has also served on the Editorial Boards of Journal of Biological Chemistry and Journal of General Physiology . Vasanthi Jayaraman

Continued on Page 8.

Spreading the Science at the BPS Annual Meeting!

President’s Message Biophysicist in Profile Inside

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The coronavirus couldn’t keep attendees from gathering in a virtual setting for the Biophysical Society 65th Annual Meeting. Biophysicists fromover 42 countries had a variety of sessions to choose from. The meeting began on a Monday with 16 Subgroup symposia followed by four full days of scientific programming. Symposia included the Future of Biophysics, New and Notable, the Best of Biophysical Journal , and the President’s Symposium: Building an Inclusive Biophysical Society. Eva Nogales , University of California, Berkeley, presented her work in the highly anticipated BPS Lecture, “Visualizing Structure, Dynamics and Interactions of Complex Macromolecular Assemblies.” With over 400 daily poster presentations, public affairs sessions, career development opportunities, network- ing, and exhibits, there was something for everyone. While we could not be in-person, it was another great meeting where researchers came to explore, understand, and solve biological problems and create new collaborations and research communities.

Public Affairs Publications

Career Development

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Annual Meeting

Grants and Opportunities

Member Corner Communities Upcoming Events

For meeting highlights, see Page 10.

President’s Message

Report fromCouncil The 2021 virtual Annual Meeting was full of firsts for BPS and, al- though we’ve had two virtual Coun- cil meetings already, these were our first virtual Joint and New Council

implementation and execution of the 2021 virtual meeting were discussed at length. A survey is being sent to meeting attendees to gather more feedback, and responses will be shared with Council and Program Chairs. Lukas Tamm, Chair of the Thematic Meeting Committee, joined Council to present a revised proposal for a 2022 Thematic Meeting. The proposal was approved, and the new meeting will be announced once the schedule has been determined. Since we were not able to hold any Thematic Meetings or BPS Conferences in 2020 due to the pandemic, and some of the 2021 meetings will be delayed as well, Council decided not to issue a call for new proposals in 2021 and instead will priori- tize rescheduling previously approved meetings. Kathleen Hall, Chair of the Publications Committee, present- ed a recommendation to Council for a new Editor-in-Chief for Biophysical Journal to succeed Jane Dyson at the end of her term. Vasanthi Jayaraman was unanimously approved by Council and will start her term as Editor-in-Chief on 1 January 2022. Kathleen also provided an update on BPS’s new journal, Biophysical Reports , which officially launched on 22 February, the first day of the Annual Meeting. Council enthusiastically approved a proposal to rename the BPS Innovation Award after a distinguished member of the Society. This award recognizes a BPS member who advanc- es our fundamental understanding of biological systems through the development of novel theory, models, concepts, techniques, or application. A detailed announcement will be included in the May issue of the BPS Bulletin . Council approved the 2021 Nominating Committee which is charged with developing the slate for the 2022 BPS election. Henry Colecraft will chair the 2021 Nominating Committee and will be supported by Committee members Taviare Hawkins, Anna Moroni, Jenny Ross, Cathy Royer, and Pernilla Wittung-Staf- shede. As noted in the Fall Council Report in the December 2020 issue of the BPS Bulletin , the Society has a deficit budget for 2021 due to the impacts of the pandemic on the Annu- al Meeting and membership numbers. Council received an update on BPS finances including current membership and registration counts, which were higher than anticipated but still well below the numbers prior to the pandemic. BPS Trea- surer, Kalina Hristova, shared that reserves are still strong and will help the Society through this difficult year. BPS Secretary Erin Sheets gave Council an update on Sub- groups. Subgroup symposia occurred on the first day of the

meetings. Joint Council, a combi- nation of the current, the outgoing, and the incoming Council members, met virtually on 18 and 20 Febru- ary. New Council, the current cohort, then met virtually on 2 March.

Frances Separovic

Outgoing Council members, Linda Columbus, Jenny Ross, David Stokes, and Pernilla Wittung-Stafshede, as well as Past-Pres- ident David Piston, were recognized for their service and outstanding contributions to Council. Henry Colecraft, Kumiko Hayashi, Susan Marqusee, and Kandice Tanner, were welcomed as incoming Councilors along with Gail Robertson, who tran- sitioned into the President-Elect position at the BPS Annual Business Meeting on Wednesday 24 February. Cathy Royer became Past-President at the Business Meeting as she passed the gavel (screen to screen!) to now President Frances Separovic. At Joint Council, reports from the Editors-in-Chief of Biophys- ical Journal and The Biophysicist as well as from the Chairs of the Inclusion & Diversity (CID), Professional Opportunities for Women (CPOW), Early Careers, Education, Membership, and Public Affairs Committees were reviewed. Council agreed all the Committees have been very productive and engaged, with many delivering excellent virtual programming in support of members these past many months. Most of the Committees have additional programming scheduled for Biophysics Week, 22-26 March, and some have events planned for later this spring and summer as well. A portion of the Joint Council meeting was dedicated to a review and update of the abstract categories for the Annu- al Meeting to ensure we are offering the most up-to-date research categories with the appropriate names as well as relevant techniques. The modifications will be implemented for the 2022 Annual Meeting. 2021 Program Co-chairs, Patricia Bassereau and Bertrand Garcia-Moreno, and 2022 Program Co-chairs Betsy Komives and Art Palmer, provided updates at Joint Council on their respective Annual Meeting programs. Member-suggested sessions and speakers were incorporated into both programs, and the Co-chairs aimed for gender balance as well as scien- tific and geographic diversity. The Co-chairs then reported to New Council, where feedback on the sessions along with the

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President’s Message

Officers President Frances Separovic President-Elect Gail Robertson Past-President Catherine A. Royer Secretary Erin Sheets Treasurer Kalina Hristova Council Henry Colecraft Michelle A. Digman Erin C. Dueber Marta Filizola Gilad Haran Kumiko Hayashi Francesca Marassi

Annual Meeting and experienced a number of glitches as we all adjusted to the online plat- form, the speaker transitions, the differences between the Q&A functionality and the chat feature, etc. Despite the hiccups, the science was deemed excellent and the attendance was similar to in-person Subgroup Saturdays. Sheets met with Subgroup Chairs the day before New Council and was able to share their feedback and thoughts with Council. With two new Subgroups being added to the list for 2022, Council briefly discussed the future of Subgroups, including the optimal number of groups, feasibility of supporting them, and membership requirements. This discussion will continue at Spring Council and a survey of Subgroup leadership, and poten- tially full BPS membership, to help inform the discussion is being planned.

Council noted that this year Annual Meeting Workshops and Biophysics Week will occur virtually before the end of March. Many BPS Committees that usually meet in person during the Annual Meeting will convene via Zoom in March and April. Additional virtual events are under consideration for the Fall. While the details of the next Annual Meeting will be an important agenda item for Spring Council, Council certainly hopes we will all be together again in San Francisco for BPS 2022! As always, we welcome your feedback and input on how BPS can best support you — our members. Please reach out to us at any time: fs@unimelb.edu.au or jpesanelli@biophysics.org — Frances Separovic, President — Jennifer Pesanelli, Executive Officer

Susan Marqusee Joseph A. Mindell Carolyn A. Moores Kandice Tanner Biophysical Journal Jane Dyson Editor-in-Chief The Biophysicist Sam Safran Editor-in-Chief Biophysical Reports

Be an inspiration to your community and help change the lives of those interested in or studying science. Sign up to be a mentor, K-12 classroom visitor, speaker, science fair judge, or student chapter sponsor. The FaB (Find a Biophysicist) Network is free and accessible by mem- bers and nonmembers, but only BPS members may join the network. To join FaB, login to your myBPS account and get involved. Help build this network by signing up today. For more information, visit biophysics.org/get-involved. Use Your Expertise toMake a Difference! Do you know a biophysicist who deserves recognition? Nominate a colleague for a Society Award DeadlineMay 1 For information and to submit a nomination, visit www.biophysics.org/awards-funding/society-awards.

Jörg Enderlein Editor-in-Chief

Society Office Jennifer Pesanelli Executive Officer Newsletter Executive Editor Jennifer Pesanelli Managing Editor Beth Staehle

Production Catie Curry Ray Wolfe Proofreader/Copy Editor Laura Phelan The Biophysical Society Newsletter (ISSN 0006-3495) is published eleven times per year, January-December, by the Biophysical Society, 5515 Security Lane, Suite 1110, Rockville, Maryland 20852. Distributed to USA members and other countries at no cost. Cana- dian GST No. 898477062. Postmaster: Send address changes to Biophysical Society, 5515 Security Lane, Suite 1110, Rockville, MD 20852. Copyright © 2021 by the Biophysical Society.

Printed in the United States of America. All rights reserved.

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Biophysicist in Profile

Denise Okafor Areas of Research

Institution Pennsylvania State University

Molecular dynamics simulations to investigate mechanisms of allosteric regulation in proteins

At-a-Glance

Denise Okafor grew up in a family that valued education. Her father was a businessman and her mother worked in personnel management, and both held master’s degrees, which helped inspire Okafor and her siblings to pursue advanced degrees. Though she planned to go to medical school, an undergraduate research opportunity spurred a change of course, and she set down the path toward her career as a research scientist.

Denise Okafor

Denise Okafor , assistant professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at Pennsylvania State University, was a biomedical chemistry major in college. There was not much opportunity for undergraduate research at her school, Oral Roberts University. She participated in a Research Experience for Undergraduates program during the summer following her junior year. “At the University of Memphis, I performed quan- tum mechanics calculations on supramolecular host-guest complexes. I found that I really enjoyed scientific research, and at the same time, my coursework helped me develop a deep love for chemistry. I made the choice to replace my premed aspirations with graduate school instead,” she shares. “The combination of my biochemical background with my limited computational research experience pushed me in the direction of computational biophysics in graduate school. I have not lost my love for this field ever since.” She went to Georgia Tech to pursue a graduate degree, where she faced the biggest challenge of her career. After failing the second attempt at her oral PhD candidacy exam, she was told that she should take courses to complete a mas- ter’s degree. She could not see a path forward. “In addition to being extremely discouraged, I had a hard time envisioning any other career. I think that when a person is at this point, it is very hard — if not impossible — for them to emerge from it without external validation. I was very fortunate to have good mentors in the department who served as this external voice for me, encouraging me to find a path to re-enroll in the PhD program and try again. While it was hard to get past such a huge setback (personally and academically), I kept these mentors close as I moved forward,” she shares. “In hindsight, the choice to push past those events and try again built a resiliency in me that I believe will last the rest of my academic career. A decade later, I can look back at the many other chal- lenges I’ve encountered since, and I realize that nothing I’ve dealt with since rivals that one challenging experience from graduate school.” This includes starting a new lab and having a baby in the same year as a global pandemic.

Following completion of her PhD, she joined the lab of Eric Ortlund at Emory University, where the focus was combining structural biology and biochemistry to study transcriptional signaling. Okafor used molecular dynamics simulations to investigate mechanisms of ligand regulation in nuclear recep- tors. Suzanne Mays was a PhD student in Ortlund’s lab when Okafor joined as a postdoc. “Denise has been one of my favorite people to work with, and we’ve been productive together. Our research in the Ortlund lab was focused on understanding how synthetic agonists activate a nuclear hor- mone receptor named LRH-1. Agonists of LRH-1 are highly sought as therapeutics for diseases such as type 2 diabetes, but it has been challenging to develop them due to a poor understanding of how LRH-1 responds to ligands to switch into the active state. We used an approach that combined X-ray crystallography and molecular dynamics simulations to study how different synthetic ligands interacted with LRH-1 and changed its conformation to activate the receptor. This work led to the development of more potent and effec- tive agonists,” Mays shares. “Even though we are not close geographically anymore, we are still working together a little. We are currently working on a computational project to study ligand-driven activation of LRH-1. Denise has an amazing focus and drive that I truly admire. Once she decided that she wanted to start her own lab, she moved swiftly and directly toward that goal. She is absolutely fearless in pursuit of her dreams.” In January 2020, Okafor started her own lab as an assis- tant professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at Pennsylvania State University. “The biggest focus in my lab is understanding how proteins — nuclear receptors in particular — are allosterically regulated. Nuclear receptors are ligand-regulated transcription factors. Ligands bind to the ligand binding domain of nuclear receptors, leading to allosteric (long-range) modulation of DNA binding at the DNA

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Biophysicist in Profile

binding domain,” she explains. “The mechanisms by which these two domains coordinate to achieve ligand-specific tran- scriptional outcomes is poorly understood. Small changes in ligand structure will often lead to large, unintuitive changes in transcriptional activity. The goal of my lab is to combine mo- lecular dynamic simulations with biophysical and biochemical experiments to understand how ligands achieve transcrip- tional control in nuclear receptors.” Tracy Hei Yan Yu was the first graduate student to join Okafor’s lab at Penn State. “Our lab studies allosteric signal- ing in nuclear receptors. And my project is to investigate the mechanisms of allosteric regulation in Farnesoid X receptor, using a variety of biochemical, biophysical, and computational methods. In particular, I am interested in studying how ligand structure, coregulator recruitment and promoter specificity contribute to allosteric regulation in Farnesoid X receptor,” she says. “The most memorable quality of Denise is that she makes you feel like you are not alone (and this is the major reason that I joined the lab). I have had this feeling since I rotated with her. There was nothing established in the lab, and I was the first student to start setting up the equipment and doing some simple experiments. She was always there working with me. Even though we have more people working in the lab now and she is very busy with her work and a new- born baby, she is always approachable and willing to help you when you have any struggles.”

The most rewarding aspect of her career is seeing her ideas attempted successfully. “All the ideas do not always work as anticipated, but it is a rush like no other when they do. A close second for me has been seeing the members of my lab (postdocs and students) adopt the research ideas I have put forward, develop their own passion for the questions and drive the work forward. It has been very rewarding to see them put their own spin on the research ideas and it gets me excited about the potential we have to contribute meaningful- ly to the field.” Okafor has very clearly seen the importance of mentoring in her own career, so her advice to those just starting out in biophysics is to seek out good mentors. “They can really make all the difference. You want people who will be responsive and unselfish in their mentoring. And you should also look to pay this mentoring forward to younger scientists,” she says. “Don’t be resistant to unsolicited advice, because you don’t know what you don’t know. Instead, run it all through your judgment filters, save the advice that is valuable and toss the rest. Finally, I would say try to stay focused. Biophysics is a broad field that provides a nearly overwhelming wealth of tools to answer any given question. I’m learning that it is important to stay focused on my scientific goals and try to not get distracted by the latest, flashiest thing. But this also applies to focusing on our own careers: it is very easy, but also very unproductive to compare our paths to other people’s. Stay focused.”

Get Involved. The Biophysical Society provides many opportunities for members to get involved and give back to the biophysics community.

To learn more about the different opportunities, please visit www.biophysics.org/get-involved.

Gain Leadership Experience. Make a Difference. Expand Your Network.

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Public Affairs

A Return to the Era of US Earmarks? On February 26, House Appropriations Chair Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) and Senate Appropriations Chair Patrick Leahy (D-VT) reached mutual agreement on earmarks. Appropriations members from across the aisle appear to be on board with the plan. The House Appropriations Committee released a fact sheet to accompany the agreement, but some highlights include: • Earmarks will not exceed one percent of total spending. • Each subcommittee will review requests and they must follow the 2010 standards. • The Government Accounting Office will review some FY 2022 earmarks to make sure they meet the standards. • There will also likely be a limit on the amount of earmarks a member can have included. This breakthrough agreement comes just days after conservatives in the House and Senate launched an effort to ban earmarks, planning a letter to Appropriations chairs and an op-ed in support of the Earmark Elimination Act. Representative Ted Budd (R-NC) and Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) are leading the charge in support of the Act, which would permanently ban earmarks from the legislative process. Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) has said he can “guarantee” the return of earmarks “will be bipartisan.” While some Republicans in both chambers have tentatively signaled openness to the return of earmarks in annual spending bills, House Republican leadership has been quiet on the issue.

Congress Looks Ahead to Reinstatement of the Debt Ceiling The US federal debt limit will be reinstated August 1 after a two-year suspension, and House and Senate Democratic leaders have not said how exactly they will address the debt ceiling. Under the House “Gephardt rule,” a vote to adopt a budget resolution automatically triggers passage of a sep- arate resolution suspending the debt limit for that full fiscal year. A House Budget Committee spokesperson indicated that Democrats plan to use the rule later this year on a fiscal year 2022 budget resolution. Democrats could use the recon- ciliation process to pass a debt limit measure through the Senate with a simple majority, but that process only allows lawmakers to increase the debt limit, not suspend it, meaning leadership would likely have to choose between the Gephardt rule and reconciliation. Another option would be to attach a debt limit measure to another must-pass piece of legislation such as an appropriations bill, but the exact timing of this

would depend on how long the Treasury can delay breaching the debt ceiling by using “extraordinary measures” to pause outlays. Becerra’s Confirmation to HHS Appears On-Track Once considered one of President Biden ’s most vulnerable nominees, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra appears headed toward confirmation as the nation’s first Latino Secretary of Health and Human Services. Several days of hearings were held at the end of February with only a few fireworks and no serious blows inflicted to derail his confir- mation. Members of the Senate Finance Committee pointed to the COVID-19 crisis in opposing or backing him as the right choice to lead the nation’s health agency, and Republicans expressed concern with his record of support for abortion rights. But even Republicans acknowledged that Becerra will probably be confirmed.

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Public Affairs

Around theWorld France Hopes Citizens’ Panel Can Reduce Vaccine Skepticism All across Europe, coronavirus vaccines are in scarce supply. But in France, they are also surprisingly unwanted: Recent polls suggest just 57 percent of the country intends to get vaccinated. Polling from December 2020 shows France fifth out of 32 nations for vaccine antipathy. With persistent, world-leading rates of vaccine skepticism, France is adopting a new tactic to boost trust: A 35-member citizens’ vaccine panel, built from a random but demographi- cally representative slice of the country, to steer government strategy on COVID-19 vaccinations. The panel is one of an increasing number of citizen assemblies that have been set up across Europe to grapple with thorny questions at the intersection of science and society. The new vaccine panel is designed to be more than an ad hoc gathering. Its members match French society by age and edu- cation level and include a representative contingent of people with skeptical views of vaccines. Run by the Economic, Social and Environmental Council (CESE), an assembly of organiza- tions from civil society, the panel can call for presentations by any experts it wants, and it will remain in business until the end of the vaccination campaign. Even without the efforts of the vaccine panel, French sen- timent about vaccines appears to have shifted, at least for

COVID-19. The latest figure for the proportion who intend to get vaccinated, 57 percent, is 17 points higher than it was in December 2020, according to an Ipsos poll. UK Announces NewAdvanced Research and Invention Agency In an effort to reinvigorate the United Kingdom’s research and development endeavors, the government announced the creation of an independent, scientist-led funder named the Advanced Research & Invention Agency (ARIA) on February 19. The program, modeled in a similar vein to the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), goal of ARIA is to take on “high-risk, high-reward” projects that are largely unencumbered by the bureaucratic interference and finicky grant procedures of traditional research projects. The United Kingdom has an annual research and development budget of around £14.6 billion. To start, ARIA will receive £800 million total over the next four years. In comparison, the United States allocates around $3.5 billion to DARPA each year. This disparity has drawn some skepticism over what can reasonably be expected from ARIA. The UK government will be recruiting scientists at the top of their fields and it will be up to these experts — and not politi- cians — to guide ARIA’s projects forward. The goal is to have the new agency up and running by next year.

Webinar Series

Webinar 3: Evidence-Based Approaches to Improve Your Teaching – Designing Assessments April 12, 2021, 12:00 PM– 1:30 PMUSA Eastern The next webinar in the series will focus on designing assessment tools. The guest speaker will be Dawn Meredith, developer of curricular materials for the reform of the introductory physics course for life science students and seed contributor to the Living Physics Portal (www.livingphysicsportal.org). The series seeks to help attendees to become more effective in their teaching of biophysics, while valuing diversity and equity. The webinar is free, but registration is required at www.thebiophysicist.org.

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Publications

Know the Editor Lucie Delemotte

Continued from Front Page

BPS Appoints NewBJ Editor-in-Chief The BPS Publications Committee, who recommended her appointment to Council, was impressed with Jayaraman’s ideas for building community among the journal editors, increasing diversity, and increasing journal visibility at the Annual Meeting. In addition to her goal of publishing excellent science, she shared ideas for a junior investigator mentor- ship program and expanded presence of the journal on social media. “It is with great pleasure that we welcome Vasanthi’s ap- pointment as Editor-in-Chief of BJ,” said Biophysical Society President Frances Separovic . “She is brilliant in her own work and her experience at BJ has given her an appreciation of the rewards of extensive interchange and cooperation between editors and authors. I am particularly excited by Vasanthi’s plans for connecting BJ to young investigators and members of the Society.”

KTH Royal Institute of Technology Editor, Proteins Biophysical Journal

Lucie Delemotte

What are you currently working on that excites you? We recently adapted analysis tools borrowed frommachine learning to make sense of noisy data coming frommolec- ular dynamics simulations of complex membrane protein systems. In the paper introducing the toolbox, we had tried the tools on a few systems of interest in the lab (calmodulin, a prototypical GPCR, and a voltage-sensor domain of an ion channel). Now we are applying them further to more com- plex systems and they just keep delivering! They are helping us understand electromechanical coupling in ion channels, which turns out to be a more complex problem than we ini- tially thought now that we have high-resolution structures of several family members. Another project I’m excited about is to categorize all the enhanced sampling MD simulation techniques out there; it is truly a jungle and, even for experiences practitioners, it is difficult to get an overview picture and understand which method to apply for a specific case. Several methods with different names are based on the same physical principle, but the different notations and jargon used obscure this fact. With collaborators, we are organizing the methods and trying to express them in a common framework to make it easier to compare them and use them appropriately! How do you stay on top of all the latest developments in your field? I’ve been using Twitter for the past few years and it’s been a great tool to follow what people in the Twitter community are excited about. I worry this does create a bubble where people not on Twitter are excluded, but the sense of com- munity I have gotten has really made it worth it. I actually really recommend joining, especially in this time when we cannot easily meet in person! Being active on the editorial boards of community journals is a major way to stay on top of the state-of-the-art!

Open for Submissions

Biophysical Reports , the fully Gold Open Access journal from the Biophysical Society, provides a new publishing option for Society members and others. Editor-in-Chief Jörg Enderlein invites biophysics research from all disciplines encom- passed by biophysics, with a particular emphasis on methods and techniques. The journal will feature short Letters and Reports with rapid turnarounds as well as Research Articles and Re- views. Publication fees will be waived for the first 10 new submissions accepted by the journal!

biophysreports.org

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Career Development

Navigating Imposter Syndrome “All I can see is everything I’m doing wrong that is a sham and a fraud.” — Don Cheadle

helped me through some hard times: Recognize the Feeling. Sure, this may sound silly, but some- times we get caught up in our emotions and don’t focus on what is causing them. Being consciously aware that we are experiencing Imposter Syndrome enables us to take the next steps. Keep Track of Your Success. One of the best ways to respond to your inner voice telling you, “I just got lucky, I don’t belong in this position,” is to write a list of all your qualifications that matched the job listing or think about all the education, career, and training milestones you have achieved so far. For me, constantly updating my CV allows me to keep visual track of my accomplishments, education, and skills. I keep a version of my CV that I label my “Everything CV.” It is version that in- cludes every single tiny detail of my education, research, and outreach achievements, even the ones that may be irrelevant to future job applications. Watching my list of achievements continuously grow helps keep Imposter Syndrome at bay. Talk About It. Yes, shout it from the rooftops if you must, but you probably don’t have to. If you bring up Imposter Syndrome with your friends, peers, and even your mentors, you will find that you are not alone. Sometimes knowing you’re not alone in your experiences can make them less overwhelming and working through your emotions with others can be helpful. Embrace It. I’ve experienced Imposter Syndrome for as long as I can remember, and sometimes the only way I can get myself out of that funk is by telling myself, “Okay, I feel like an imposter because I don’t know XYZ, so let’s learn it!” I hope that as a community we can build a strong support system for everyone. Since Imposter Syndrome is most often triggered and reinforced by external factors, working to increase minority representation in all areas and to foster an environment focused on learning and self-fulfillment is the only way to eradicate Imposter Syndrome. — Molly Cule

Many people struggle with “Imposter Syndrome” at least at one point in their life, and many confess that they contin- ue to feel like an imposter throughout their entire career. This feeling can creep up when we are alone working on

a project and feel like nothing is going right, or it can take hold in a lecture hall when you find yourself surrounded by people who just seem like they know more than you. Research sug- gests that Imposter Syndrome in graduate students is most common among people with minority status regardless of whether that status is a product of their gender, race, eth- nicity, or socioeconomic background (Cokley, K., et al., 2013. https:/doi.org/10.1002/j.2161-1912.2013.00029.x). We all need to take some time and try to understand why so many among us feel this way and how we can all work through it. The first thing we need to do is find the root of these feelings. Personally, I find that the biggest contributor to the imposter feeling is people discounting their own skills! We all study, practice, and train and then when we use these skills, we don’t give ourselves the proper credit because it is “easy” for us. We have this misconception that everything impres- sive has to be hard, all the time. The truth of the matter is, it is only easy for you now because you have developed your knowledge and skills. To almost everyone else, it is still diffi- cult and impressive. We can also trap ourselves in a vicious cycle of imposter syndrome by thinking negatively about ourselves when we don’t have all the answers or fail at a particular task. There may be many causes for people to develop a negative internal monologue including unsupportive family, traumatic experi- ences, or even fear of failure on the scholastic level in primary and secondary school. There are many tips on the internet for dealing with Imposter Syndrome, and as a personal sufferer, I can tell you that they are mostly easier said than done. Here are the tips that have

Numbers By the The first ever BPS Virtual Annual Meeting 2021 had 60 exhibitors, 18 sponsors, and 13 exhibitor presentations.

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Annual Meeting

Turning Over the Gavel! The Biophysical Society business meeting took place on Wednesday, February 24, with record attendance. The Officers provided updates on the Society’s year-end report. Outgoing President Catherine A. Royer passed the gavel to incoming President Frances Separovic .

Catherine A. Royer, Outgoing President; Kalina Hristova, Treasurer; Erin Sheets, Secretary; Frances Separovic, Incoming President; and Gail Robertson, President Elect.

website for the description of the winning images www.biophysics.org. Image Contest

Congratulations to the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winners of the Biophysical Society Art of Science Image Contest. The 10 finalists were voted on during the virtual meeting. Thank you to Chroma Technology for sponsoring the contest and prizes. Visit the

1 st Place Compete or Co-exist Rachel Fisher, CUNY Advanced Science Research Center

2 nd Place The Face of Swimming Sperm Revealed Christoph Brenker, University of Münster

3 rd Place A Mitochondrion Under the Computational Microscope Melanie König, University of Gronengen

Congratulations to the winners of the BPS Exhibitor Scavenger Hunt! Samsung Galaxy Winner – Feng Yu , University of California Merced Fitbit Versa Winner – Mohamed Shehata , Acibadem University Medical Biotechnology

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Annual Meeting

Thank you Biophysical Society for this great session, “President’s Symposium: Building an Inclusive Biophysical Society”! It is a great way to convey the message that we are all different and belong to the same community. — Angieszka Pierzynska-Mach , Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia My first Biophysical Society Annual Meeting is done! What an incredible week of amazing science. It was great to get to talk and connect with such a diverse group of scientists. Hopefully, I will see you next year in San Francisco! — Becca Dean , University of Ottawa

What Attendees Are Saying

The Annual Meeting was great, very well organized, very productive.

— Alberto Diaspro , Istitute Italiano de Technologia

I must say the Society did a very good job with the networking platform, it almost felt like real in vivo networking for me.

— Ariane Nunes Alves , Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies

Had a great time attending the Biophysical Society virtual Annual Meeting this year! I especially enjoyed Dr. Eva Nogales’ lecture today on visualizing macromolecular assemblies, including the structure of the human transcription factor IID! — Jessica Desamero , Brooklyn College

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2021 Student Research Achievement Award Poster Competition Winners The 31 winners of the annual Student Research Achievement Awards were recognized at the 65th Biophysical Society An- nual Meeting Awards Ceremony on February 26, 2021. These students were selected by judges from the Society’s Sub- groups for their outstanding presentations during the poster competition. There were 116 student participants. The winners are: Bioenergetics, Mitochondria, & Metabolism Jiemin Shen , Baylor College of Medicine, USA Mechanism of Electron Transport in Mammalian Stearoyl-CoA Desaturase 1 Bioengineering Aakash Saha , University of California, Riverside, USA Cooperative Dynamics of REC-Nuc Lobes Prime Cas12a for DNA Processing Trishit Banerjee , Tohoku University, Japan Engineering of Genome Editing Protein Cas9 that Slides Along DNA Faster and Might Enable Efficient Target Search Biological Fluorescence Harikrushnan Balasubramanian , National University of Singapore SRRF ‘N’ Tirf-FCS: New Insights into EGFR-Cytoskeleton Interactions David J. Schodt , University of New Mexico, USA Quantitative Multi-Target Super-Resolution for Estimating Anti- body Labeling Efficiency Biopolymers in vivo Fathima T. Doole , University of Arizona, USA Antimicrobial Peptide-Membrane Interactions: Insights from Molecular Simulations Channels, Receptors, & Transporters Williams Miranda , University of Calgary, Canada Molecular Mechanism of hERG1 Channel Regulation by Ceramides

Dheeraj Prakaash , University of Leeds, United Kingdom Molecular Simulations Reveal the Dynamics of the T-Cell Receptor in a T-Cell Model Membrane Matthew Rook , University of Rochester Medical Center, USA ASIC Activation Mechanisms Delineated through Genetic Code Expansion Cryo-EM Hamidreza Rahmani , Florida State University, USA The Atomic Model for Myosin II Coiled-Coil Shows Novel Observa- tions and Insights into Muscle Contraction Intrinsically Disordered Proteins Lavi S. Bigman , Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel Microtubule-Based Transport is Controlled by Tubulin Tails and their Modifications Melina Theoni Gyparaki , University of Pennsylvania, USA Tau Forms Oligomeric Complexes on Microtubules that are Dis- tinct from Pathological Oligomers in Disease Anindita Mahapatra , CSIR, Indian Institute of Chemical Biology, India Membrane Cholesterol Regulates the Binding of Alpha-Synuclein to Synaptic Vesicles, and its Subsequent Functional and Patho- genic Behavior Macromolecular Machines & Assembly Sebastian Kenny , Purdue University, USA The Two Deubiquitinating Enzymes from Chlamydia Trachomatis Have Distinct Ubiquitin Recognition Properties Ines Martinez-Martin , Spanish National Center for Cardiovascu- lar Research Crystallographic Structures of Titin Immunoglobulin-Like I21 Domains Involved in Dilated Cardiomyopathy Upasana L. Mallimadugula , Washington University in St. Louis, USA A Parallel Ratchet-Stroke Mechanism Leads to an Optimum Force for Molecular Motor Function Mechanobiology Susanne Mesoy , University of Cambridge, United Kingdom The Role of the Outer Lipid-Facing Helix in Cationic pLGICs is De- pendent on the Cellular Context Amrutha Patkunarajah , University of New South Wales, Australia Disrupting Elkin1-Dependent Mechanoelectrical Transduction Modulates Cell-Cell Interactions in Organotypic Tumour Spheroids

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Membrane Structure & Function Hammad Ali Faizi , Northwestern University, USA

Weiqing Xu , Arizona State University, USA A Bayesian Nonparametric Approach to Learning Molecular Species and Diffusion Dynamics Based on Photon Arrival Data Physical Cell Biology Molly Mollica , University of Washington, USA Measuring Single-Cell Platelet Forces via Microcontact-Printed, Reference-Free Traction Force Microscopy Reveals Relationships Between Cell Shape, F-Actin Localization, and Force Yanitza Trosel , Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada Diffusion NMR and Rheology Study of a Model Polymer and a Dis- ordered Protein in the Presence of Bacterial Cell Lysate Crowders 2021 Undergraduate Poster Award Competition Winners Congratulations to the following six undergraduate students who won awards at the 2021 Annual Meeting for their poster presentations: Youna J. Choi , Amherst College, USA DNA Folding by the SARS-CoV-2 Nucleocapsid Protein Shawn H. Lin , Wesleyan University, USA Elucidation of Interactions Between Integration Host Factor and a DNA Four-Way Junction Lydia Good , Georgetown University, USA Statistical and Biophysical Analysis of Force-Pulling Optical Twee- zers Data in Complex Protein Systems Daria Wonderlick , University of Oregon, USA Characterization of Ensemble Epistasis in the Adenine Riboswitch David Tang , University of Chicago, USA The Transition Pathway Between the Closed and Open States of Insulin Degrading Enzyme Shows Two Distinct Motions: Rotation around a Hinge and Grinding Between Two Domains Adith Srivatsa , University of California, Davis, USA Molecular Dynamic Simulations Suggest Novel PIP2 Binding Sites for Sk2 Channel Regulation

Shape Fluctuations of Giant Unilamellar Vesicles and its Applica- tions to Study Electrified Membranes and Membrane Viscosity Valeria Zoni , University of Fribourg, Switzerland Seipin Accumulates and Traps Diacylglycerols and Tryglycerides in its Ring-Like Structure Chantelle Leveille , University of Washington, USA The Role of Growth Temperature and Lipid Composition in Phase Separation of Yeast Vacuole Membranes Membrane Transport Mark MacRae , New York University Grossman School of Med- icine, USA Structure of the Bacterial Lipid ABC Transporter MlaFEDB Reveals Substrate Bound Nandan Haloi , University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA Role of the Internal Loops in Gating of Outer Membrane Porins Victoria C. Young , Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, USA Displacement of the Na+/K+-Pump’s Transmembrane Domains Demonstrate Conserved Conformational Changes in P-Type 2 ATPases Motility & Cytoskeleton Lila Nehring , University of California, San Francisco, USA Opposing Motors Provide Mechanical and Functional Robustness in The Mammalian Spindle Multiscale Genome Organization Fatema Zahra Rashid , Leiden University, Netherlands Regulation of ProVWX Transcription by Local Chromatin Remodelling Nanoscale Approaches to Biology Julia R. Migliore , University of North Texas, USA Using Enzyme-Linked Markers with Chromogenic Substrates in Expansion Microscopy Jugal Saharia , Southern Methodist University, USA Chemically Tuned Solid-State Nanopores for Single-Molecule Biophysics

biophysics.org/ 2021meeting

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Congratulations to the winners of the 2021 Virtual Travel Awards! BPS provided Virtual Travel Awards to the Society’s 2021 Annual Meeting for members who are students, postdoctoral researchers, and scientists of all career levels to recognize excellence in biophysics and promote greater interaction among biophysicists throughout the world. The winners are listed below. Santosh Adhikari , University of Minneosta, USA Trishit Banerjee , Tohoku University, Japan Andrea Basciu , University of Cagliari, Italy Mac Kevin Braza , University of California, San Diego, USA Alexandra Brown , Dalhousie University, Canada Daniel Capelluto , Virginia Tech, USA Nicholas Castaneda , University of Central Florida, USA Xi Chen , University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA Wooyoung Choi , Van Andel Institute, USA Anuska Das , Florida State University, USA Anirban Das , Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, India Steven Fried , University of Arizona, USA Kirin Gada , Northeastern University, USA Francesco Garzella , Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Italy Jenisha Ghimire , Tulane University, USA Ankita Gupta , Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur Valeria Guzman Luna , University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA Fatlum Hajredini , CUNY Graduate Center, USA Ashwini Hariharan , University of Maryland Baltimore, USA Tara Hickman , Willamette University, USA Soonwoo Hong , University of Texas at Austin, USA Rachel Hutchinson , University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA Pankaj Jadhav , Indian Institute of Science, India Shobhna Kapoor , Indian Institute of Technology Bombay Taranpreet Kaur , University at Buffalo, State University, USA Sarah Hyun Ji Kim , University of Pennsylvania, USA Bojian Ding , Stony Brook University, USA Fathima Doole , University of Arizona, USA Mandy Erkelens , Leiden University, the Netherlands Hammad Faizi , Northwestern University, USA Anneliese Faustino , Johns Hopkins University, USA

Zhaowei Liu , University of Basel, Switzerland Wen Ma , University of California San Diego, USA Julene Madariaga Marcos , Universität Leipzig, Germany Shankar Mandal , University of Michigan, USA Louisa Mezache , The Ohio State University, USA Molly Mollica , University of Washington, USA Guillermo Moreno Pescador , University of Copenhagen, Demark Abigail Nagle , University of Washington, USA Fiona Naughton , Arizona State University, USA Cassandra Nunez , Pennsylvania State University, USA James Osei-Owusu , Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, USA Sara Osorio Valencia , Loyola University Chicago, USA Jinho Park , University of Central Florida, USA Maria Queralt-Martin , Universitat Jaume I, Spain Fatema Zahra Rashid , Leiden Institute of Chemistry, the Netherlands Rosa Romero , University of Michigan, USA Priti Roy , Indian Institute of Science Education and Research- Kolkata, India Michelle Sahai , Univ Roehampton, United Kingdom Abhilash Sahoo , University of Maryland, USA Lara Scofano , University of Oxford, United Kingdom Hannah Seppala , University of Buffalo, USA Honglue Shi , Duke University, USA Prakash Shrestha , Boston Children’s Hospital, USA Jenaro Soto , University of California, Irvine, USA Shwetha Srinivasan , Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA David Svintradze , University of Georgia - Tbilisi Pamela Swiatlowska , New York University, USA Prince Tiwari , University of Massachusetts Medical School, USA Philip To , Johns Hopkins University, USA Semire Uzun Göçmen , Hatay Mustafa Kemal University, Turkey Kathleen Vergunst , Dalhousie University, Canada Lili Wang , Vanderbilt University Medical Center, USA Yaqiang Wang , University of California Los Angeles, USA Qi Wang , New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, USA Natalie Weber , Hannover Medical School, Germany Robert Wiener , Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, USA Xiaoan Wu , University of Miami, USA Oscar Zabala-Ferrera , University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA Xianwei Zhang , University of California, Davis, USA Shiying Zhu , Bio21 Institute, Australia

Sai Li , The Rockefeller University, USA Haixing Li , Columbia University, USA

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Cheers to Volunteers

Holly Holman Early Careers Committee

Holly Holman

Is this your first volunteer position for BPS? If not, what other positions have you held? Yes, I started as an Early Careers Committee (ECC) member and became the Chair after serving and actively participating for three years. This is my first year as Chair of the ECC and although it has added responsibilities, I have really enjoyed interacting more with other ECC members and BPS remotely, especially through the pandemic. Why do you volunteer? The Biophysical Society is highly supportive and volunteer- ing with other biophysicists has been an integral part of my career development. It is a great way to meet other scientists from all over the world. Volunteering for ECC has also an awe- some opportunity to mentor and inspire the next generation. Grants & Opportunities NIH: Team-Based Design in Biomedical Engineering Education (R25 Clinical Trial Not Allowed) This grant seeks to support programs that include inno- vative approaches to enhance biomedical engineering de- sign education to ensure a future workforce that can meet the nation’s needs in biomedical research and healthcare technologies. Who can apply: US Institutions that propose to establish new or to enhance existing team-based design courses or programs in undergraduate biomedical engineering departments or other degree-granting programs with biomedical engineering tracks/minors Deadline: May 28 Website: https:/grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/ PAR-19-215.html

What has been a highlight from your volunteer experience? A highlight for me is organizing the graduate student break- fast for the Annual Meeting. This is a great way to meet student members and provide career resources. Do you have advice for others who might be thinking about volunteering? I would encourage others to consider volunteering for BPS at any stage of their scientific career. It is a great way to net- work, learn about different research, external educational and career opportunities. When not volunteering for BPS, what do you work on? When I am not in the lab or thinking about science of the inner ear course, I enjoy hikes with my dog and spending time with friends and family.

Cottrell Scholar Award This award honors and helps to develop outstanding teacher-scholars who are recognized by their scientif- ic communities for the quality and innovation of their research programs and their academic leadership skills. This award provides entry into a national community of outstanding scholar-educators who produce significant research and educational outcomes. Who can apply: Early career tenure-track faculty at US and Canadian research universities and primarily under- graduate institutions. Deadline: July 1 Website: https:/ rescorp.org/cottrell-scholars/ cottrell-scholar-award

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