MSACL

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MSACL (the Association for Mass Spectrometry & Advances in the Clinical Lab) is a 501c3 non-profit California corporation that was officially organized in May 2009 with a founding board of David Herold, Andrew Hoofnagle, Russell Grant, Gary Siuzdak and Chris Herold.

The formation of the association was stimulated following a successful 23rd Asilomar conference on Mass Spectrometry (September 14-28 2007), chaired by Alan Rockwood and Ravinder Singh and sponsored by ASMS, entitled Mass Spectrometry in Clinical Chemistry and Molecular Diagnostics [1] .

The first unofficial MSACL conference (MSACL 2008) was held November 1-5, 2008 and organized by David Herold with the support of UCSD; MSACL was not yet an incorporated organization. The success of this conference was the impetus for officially organizing the association, which occurred in May 2009.

The first official MSACL conference (MSACL 2010) took place February 6-10, 2010 at the Hyatt Regency Mission Bay Spa & Marina in San Diego.

The association has since organized society conferences annually in the US (excepting 2020, 2021) and annually in Europe (Salzburg, Austria) from 2014-2019.

Name Change

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MSACL was originally founded as the Association for Mass Spectrometry : Applications to the Clinical Laboratory. However, a gradual realization that integration of multiple technologies will be critical to achieving improved patient outcomes resulted in changes in: (1) the association's mission statement from (i) Implementation of Mass Spectrometry in the Clinic to (ii) Improving Patient Outcomes by Overcoming the Challenges of Implementing High Value Tests in the Clinical Lab, and (2) the acronymic meaning of MSACL to the Association for Mass Spectrometry & Advances in the Clinical Lab. Soon after, the official name of the association was changed to MSACL.

MSACL has three primary modes for communicating information with the clinical analysis community: (1) conferences, (2) a society journal (JMSACL), and (3) a virtual presentation platform, MSACL Connect.

Conferences

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There is no location designation in the conference title when there is only one conference per year. Location designation started in 2014 when the European (EU) conference was run in the same year as the US-based event, and ended in 2022 when the EU conference paused operations.

MSACL 2008

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November 1-5
Hilton San Diego Resort & Spa, San Diego, CA
Attendance: 270

MSACL 2010

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February 6-10
Hyatt Regency Mission Bay Spa & Marina, San Diego, CA
Attendance: 447

MSACL 2011

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February 5-9
Sheraton Hotel & Marina, San Diego,CA
Attendance: 607

MSACL 2012

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January 14-18
Sheraton Hotel & Marina, San Diego
Attendance: 625

MSACL 2013

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February 9-13
Sheraton Hotel & Marina, San Diego
Attendance: 771

MSACL 2014 US

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March 1-5
Sheraton Hotel & Marina, San Diego
Attendance: 843

MSACL 2014 EU

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September 2-5
Salzburg Congress Center, Salzburg, AUSTRIA
Attendance: 335

MSACL 2015 US

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March 28- April 1
Sheraton Hotel & Marina, San Diego
Attendance: 970

MSACL 2015 EU

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September 8-11
Salzburg Congress Center, Salzburg, AUSTRIA
Attendance: 388

MSACL 2016 US

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February 21 - 25, 2016
Renaissance Hotel & Palm Springs Convention Center, Palm Springs, CA
Attendance: 971

MSACL 2016 EU

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September 12-15
Salzburg Congress Center, Salzburg, AUSTRIA
Attendance: 436

MSACL 2017 US

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January 22 - 26
Renaissance Hotel & Palm Springs Convention Center, Palm Springs, CA
Attendance: 827

MSACL 2017 EU

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September 10-14
Salzburg Congress Center, Salzburg, AUSTRIA
Attendance: 421

MSACL 2018 US

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January 21 - 25
Renaissance Hotel & Palm Springs Convention Center, Palm Springs, CA
Attendance: 822

MSACL 2018 EU

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September 9-13
Salzburg Congress Center, Salzburg, AUSTRIA
Attendance: 466

MSACL 2019 US

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March 31 - April 4
Renaissance Hotel & Palm Springs Convention Center, Palm Springs, CA
Attendance: 817

MSACL 2019 EU

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September 22-26
Salzburg Congress Center, Salzburg, AUSTRIA
Attendance: 580

MSACL 2022

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April 5 - 8
Monterey Conference Center, Monterey, CA
Attendance: 466 (first conference post-pandemic)

MSACL 2023

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April 2 - 7
Monterey Conference Center, Monterey, CA
Attendance: 530

Educational Grant Program

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As of MSACL 2022, the association had awarded 1577 grants at the US and EU meetings with a total investment of $1,385,000. While grants initially supported costs for travel, hotel and/or conference registration, given the large number of grants awarded, they have been scaled back to cover only conference and short course registration.

Distinguished Contribution Award

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The MSACL Distinguished Contribution Award (DCA) was initiated by Russell Grant and Andy Hoofnagle in 2014 with the first award being made at the MSACL 2015 US conference in San Diego to David Millington.

The award board is currently composed of six members with staggered three year terms.

The award is presented "In Recognition of Achievements Made in the Field of Clinical Mass Spectrometry that have Furthered the Advancement of Knowledge and the Implementation of Science for the Benefit of Humanity". It is generally awarded at the annual meeting, but there is not requirement that an award be made at each meeting. For instance, in 2022, the first year back from the pandemic, there was no DCA award.

Past Awardees

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2015 US: David Millington
Tandem Mass Spectrometry in Clinical Diagnostics, Newborn Screening and Targeted Metabolomics

2015 EU: Linda Thienpont
Mass Spectrometry as Metrological Anchor in Laboratory Medicine – a Meandering River

2016 US: Kenneth Setchell
What We Can Learn from a Drop of Urine – Metabolomics at It's Earliest: Discoveries of Bile Acid Synthesis Disorders, a New Category of Fatal Metabolic Liver Disease and Development of a Treatment

2017 US: Catherine Feneslau
Rapid Characterization of Microorganisms by Mass Spectrometry: What can be Learned and How?

2017 EU: Isabelle Fournier
Laser-based Mass Spectrometry in Clinics: Changing the Paradigm of Molecular Diagnosis

2018 US: Richard Yost
The Triple Quadrupole: Innovation, Serendipity and Persistence

2018 EU: Cedric Shackleton
Mass Spectrometry and the Elucidation of Steroid Metabolome

2019 US: Donald Hunt
Immunotherapy of Cancer and the Role of Mass Spectrometry; An Overview and New Results

2019 EU: Zoltan Takats
15 years of Ambient Mass Spectrometry: From Amino Acid Clusters to Surgical Robotics

2020 US: Alan Rockwood
My Path to Enlightenment, or How I Became a Clinical Mass Spectrometrist and Clinical Chemist
- presented virtually after meeting cancelled due to pandemic.

2021: No award (event cancelled due to pandemic).

2022: No award.

2023: Jennifer Van Eyk
The Next Phase of Precision Medicine

Michael S Bereman Award

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Journal

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A society-owned journal under the name of Clinical Mass Spectrometry (CMS) and published by Elsevier (Amsterdam) was launched in 2016. The name was changed in January 2021 to the Journal of Mass Spectrometry and Advances in the Clinical Lab (JMSACL).

When the journal was originally launched it was done so under a hybrid publishing model with Elsevier. This meant that the journal accepted both subscription and Open Access submissions. Subscription papers incurred no APC charges for the authors, but they were behind a paywall; the publisher recouped their costs via subscriptions and paper access charges. Open Access papers had APC charges of $3,300 or $2,200 for members. While the association owned the journal, Elsevier managed all of the finances including charging for subscriptions and open access page charges, providing MSACL a royalty on the profit from any payments.

The journal's application for inclusion in the PubMed index was rejected in June 2019 with the notice that it could reapply in June 2021. There was concern that without inclusion in the PubMed index, it would be difficult to attract submissions and the journal may have difficulties with sustainability.

CMS received its first Impact Factor, 1.17, in July 2020 [2].


Mirroring the name change of the association, the journal pivoted to a new name (JMSACL) and changed from a hybrid model to Open Access only with a pay-what-you-can APC structure. This allowed authors to select their payment amount from between $0-900. Under the new name and operational model, MSACL took full responsibility for all financial aspects of the journal and used Elsevier for content publication and hosting.

The journal was indexed by PubMed Central in November 2021.

The journal name change instituted a restart on the Impact Factor, and for 2021 and 2022. Although still listed in Clarivate with citations being counted, no impact factor was reported.

JMSACL received its first Impact Factor, 2.2, in July 2023 [3].

Abstracting and Indexing

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JMASCL is included in the following abstracting and indexing services.

  • PubMed
  • PubMed Central
  • Scopus
  • Science Citation Index Expanded
  • Current Contents - Clinical Medicine
  • Essential Science Indicators
  • Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)

MSACL Connect Virtual Platform

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In progress ....

References

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  1. ^ Rockwood, Alan; Singh, Ravinder. "Report of the 23rd Asilomar conference on mass spectrometry". J Am Soc Mass Spectrom 2008 Jul;19(7):R1-4. doi:10.1016/j.jasms.2008.04.022. Epub 2008 Apr 18.
  2. ^ "Journal Citation Reports". Clarivate.
  3. ^ "Journal Citation Reports". Clarivate.
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