Join us at the SETAC Asia-Pacific Meeting in Daegu, Korea

Sae Yun Kwon, SETAC Korea Organizing Committee

SETAC Asia-Pacific (SAP) annual meetings have long been one of the most widely attended international environmental toxicology and chemistry conferences across the Asia-Pacific region since the founding meeting was held in 1998 in Seoul, Korea. With the ever-growing population and economic development among the Asian countries, it is a no-brainer that diverse members from academia, industry, civil society and government need to get together to tackle both persistent and emerging environmental challenges from local to regional scales. We have thus far gathered abstracts from diverse nations including Korea, China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia and Australia.

The SETAC Asia-Pacific 2018 Meeting will be held from 16–19 September at the EXCO (international convention center) located in Daegu, a city in southeastern Korea. The meeting is coming back to another city of Korea after 20 years, this time with dramatically increased SAP membership. Daegu is a splendid city, perfectly balanced between nature and urbanization. The city is close to four UNESCO World Heritage Sites, with preserved historic temples and other significant architectural remains. Through the tour programs hosted by the SETAC organizing members, the conference attendees will have the opportunity to travel through a diverse range of sites, including the most urbanized center to serene temples of South Korea.

The theme of this year’s SAP meeting is “Data, Science, and Management Promoting Environmental Welfare,” which fits perfectly with the unconventional yet timely discipline of big data in environmental sciences. International and multi-stakeholder discussions on how to best couple the generation, utilization and management of big data relevant to environmental toxicology, chemistry and health will become a critical task for supporting inclusive environmental welfare. Under the large umbrella of this theme, a total of 34 interdisciplinary sessions, which are broadly categorized as environmental chemistry, environmental toxicology, risk assessment and management, and environmental policy, aim to provide stages for sharing scientific work and for engaging in active discussion and collaboration. The conference organizers are working with a number of journals to create special series or special issues to highlight the research being presented at the meeting. Abstracts submitted to the journals will be subject to the normal peer-review process but will receive special attention upon publication.

In addition to the scientific sessions, two of the best features of the SETAC meetings are the planned highly renowned plenary speakers and programs led by the students. This year’s invited speakers come from diverse areas of expertise to share their leading roles from academic, business and government communities and for tackling important environmental challenges across the Asia-Pacific countries. Three different student programs –Asia-Pacific Student Advisory Council Exhibition, mentoring program and the student social–will further promote the engagement among the young scientists, who will become the next generation of our environmental taskforce.

We very much look forward to meeting you at the SETAC Asia-Pacific 2018 Meeting in Daegu, Korea.

Author’s contact information: info.setacap2018@gmail.com

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