Call for Site Proposals: ACM-BCB Conferences
Site proposals for future ACM Conference on Bioinformatics and Computational Biology are invited from interested groups. ACM-BCB is the official conference of the ACM SIGBio.
Site proposals should be no longer than 2 page ASCII text (66 lines, 80 columns). Proposals must be submitted by email to the current ACM SIG Bio Director of Conferences (Vasant Honavar, honavar@cs.iastate.edu) with the subject: "ACM-BCB site proposal - YEAR" no later than May 31, at least a year ahead of the proposed conference.
Site proposals should cover the following topics:
- Geographic Region: For 2012, the location is North America. In the future, we will consider rotating the location to other regions (Europe, Asia, etc.)
- Potential dates: Potential dates should be chosen so as to avoid conflicts with major conferences in related areas (ISMB, BIBM, CSB, BIBE, RECOMB, etc.)
- Site city:
- The city should be located near a major airport, within 1-2 hours of regular train service and/or 45 minutes of cab/shuttle service. The airport should be served at least two airlines with regular service through a major international airport to the 4 major continents of SIG Bioinformatics attendees: Asia, Europe, North and South America.
- The city should have one or more conference venues that can accommodate conferences with 300-600 attendees, including suitable facilities for 4-6 concurrent tutorials or workshops with up to 100 attendees each. The venues should include facilities with one to 3 large center screens, with unobstructed views, and projectors and audiovisual equipment appropriate for plenary sessions. The venue should include suitable reception and banquet facilities. Please do NOT contact possible venues regarding availability or cost. ACM negotiates the cost, availability, and contracts directly with candidate venues. However, you may include estimates based on your knowledge of recent conferences, especially ACM conferences (if any), held at the venues under consideration. A sample list of possible venues with a 1-line description addressing logistics (time to get there, need for transportation) would be useful. The availability of low-cost or subsidized venues e.g., the conference facilities at a major university would be a plus.
- The city should have hotels that can house 500-700 people (attendees and their guests) within easy access to the possible venue. The availability of inexpensive accommodations for student participants is a plus.
- Conference Organizers:
- The proposal must include the name and affiliation of an active member of the SIG Bioinformatics community based in or very close to the proposed site city who is willing to serve as general chair; this may eventually require a statement of support from the chair's institution, and possibly administrative and organizational support.
- The proposal may include: 2 co-chairs, one of whom must be local; The names and affiliations of a few other candidates that the chair can enlist to serve on the committee, notably a local person as local arrangements chair, a publicity chair, treasurer, etc.
- The proposal must not include the names of program committee chairs (The ACM SIGBio Board of Directors will select the program chairs).
- Dates and conflicts: Please indicate which dates have conflicts with major local events, etc. that could interfere with the availability of either the proposed site or the proposed conference organizers. The proposed dates should consider conflicts with major conferences on related topics (ISMB, AAAI, IEEE BIBE, IEEE BIBM, RECOMB, PSB, etc.) The dates of ACM-BCB will ultimately be selected by the SIG Bioinformatics Executive Committee, based on the proposals received and feedback from surveys conducted at SIGBio.