In the back of each issue of this magazine there are four regular departments containing information of general use to the microscopy community: NetNotes, Industry News, Product News, and the Calendar. While these departments are edited by dedicated volunteers, the information they contain is largely supplied by the microscopy community itself.
NetNotes are excerpts from the question and answer files of the Microscopy Society of America's Microscopy Listserver. Last year this listserver, created and maintained by Nestor Zaluzec, reached its 25th anniversary making it one of the oldest services of its type. The questions asked and answered in NetNotes are often about why a procedure or instrument is behaving in a strange way. Typically several experts with experience in the topic offer solutions to the problem. Thomas Phillips has produced NetNotes for 18 years, including two years when NetNotes was part of Microscopy and Microanalysis.
Industry News provides brief notices about companies and people in the microscopy community. Product News gives brief descriptions of new microscopy products and provides a website URL where more information can be found. This free service allows companies to describe, directly to microscopists, their products and activities. Ron Anderson has been producing these items from press releases and other sources for 17 years, the first seven of which were when he was the Editor-in-Chief of this publication.
Our Calendar is the place to look for notices about future microscopy-related meetings and courses. It is the most comprehensive microscopy calendar in the world. Meetings related to various fields are listed because certain scientific disciplines have developed specialized specimen preparation and instruments for their needs. Paul Webster has edited the Calendar for nearly a decade.
Tom Phillips, Ron Anderson, and Paul Webster together have provided a combined 45 years of service to Microscopy Today and Microscopy and Microanalysis. I greatly appreciate their expertise, diligence, and advice. On behalf of the microscopy community, I say “thank you.”
