Online conferences have benefits worth retaining

For me, nothing’s quite the same as a scientific conference. I normally go to a lot – approximately one a month. However, I haven’t been to a full-day event since January. I start to feel a bit stir-crazy without catching up with my usual meeting buddies in so long, but the current global crisis has rightly caused my intended spring and summer meetings to be cancelled.

I believe that learnings from the research talks are only one of a series of benefits of public meeting attendance. It’s a great privilege to catch up with researchers from other institutions, friends you’ve met at other meetings, and particularly former co-workers. I always make a point of going round the exhibition to get up to speed with the vendors too: they have the inside track on many aspects of science life.