Welcome to AAEMS !
Human DNA is continuously damaged by various exogenous and endogenous chemical agents. To evaluate the potential risk and prevent the hazard of chemical mutagens, Environmental Mutagen Societies (EMS) have been established in north America, Europe and Japan in 1970s. International Association of EMS (IAEMS) has been organized later to accelerate communication and collaboration among EMS in the world. Here, I introduce the Asian Association of EMS (AAEMS), which is a regional association of Environmental Mutagen Societies in Asia. This association has been established to provide a means whereby those engaged in environmental mutagenesis research and related fields may communicate more readily with each other, and advance both basic and applied research in this area. Current participants of AAMES are Japanese EMS, Chinese EMS, Korean EMS, Thailand EMS, Philippine EMS and Indian EMS. We are welcome to other EMS in Asian area as well. In separate files, you can see the list of officials of AAEMS (2008-2009) and the constitution.
President of AAEMS
Takehiko Nohmi
1st ACEM was held in November 2007.
We have held 1st Asian Conference on Environmental Mutagens (1st ACEM) on November 29 and 30, 2007 in Kita-kyushu in Japan in conjunction with 36th annual meeting of Japanese EMS (photo 1). Professor Hiroshi Kasai was the meeting president. More than 400 people attended the meeting and about 70 of them came from outside of Japan mostly from Asian countries. The oversea participants were not only from the AAEMS member countries but also from Malaysia and Taiwan. English was the official language throughout the conference. In the first day, two symposia and one workshop were held. The symposia were gmechanisms of environmental mutagenesis and carcinogenesis including oxidative stressh and gmutagen & anti-mutagen in Asian foodsh and the workshop was gICH revised guidance on genotoxicity testingh. Poster session was also held with more than 100 posters. The quality of presentations was high enough to invoke active discussion. In the second day, Dr. Brooke T. Mossman, University of Vermont U.S.A., gave a timely plenary lecture of "asbestos-induced inflammation and carcinogenesis; role of oxidative stress and cell signaling pathways". After the plenary lecture, platform session was held for oral presentation where the speakers were selected among the poster presenters. 1st ACEM has been successfully ended in the afternoon of November 30.
Executive committee members of AAEMS
One day before the conference, AAEMS executive committee was held in the same venue (photo 2). Eleven executive committee members and five observers including Dr. David DeMarini, President of IAEMS, attended the committee. The following persons were elected as AAEMS officials of next two years (2008-2009): Takehiko Nohmi (JEMS), President; Jia Cao (CEMS), Vice-President; Malyn Chulasiri (TEMS), Vice-President; Young-Joon Surh (KEMS), Secretary General; Takashi Yagi (JEMS), Treasurer.
2nd ACEM will be held in Thailand in 2010.
For the 2nd ACEM meeting, three countries wanted to be the host and Thailand (TEMS) finally won the competition. Dr. Malyn Chulasiri (TEMS) announced to hold the 2nd ACEM in Thailand in 2010.
