2020 annual meeting summary

The 2020 annual meeting for the Chinese Association for Food Protection in North American (CAFPNA) was held on Oct 26 virtually. We had 40-50 members participating in the meeting this year.

IAFP executive board President-Elect Dr. Ruth Petran again joined our meeting and provided an opening remark with a warm welcome and appreciation of CAFPNA's accomplishment in the past year. Although Covid made it difficult for all IAFP members to meet face to face this year, she, along with IAFP executive board and other IAFP staff did an excellent job organizing a virtual annual meeting. Dr. Petran encouraged all participants to continue their involvement and contribution to IAFP, even during this tough time.

Our current president, Zengxin “Scott” Li, followed the section with the presentation of the annual activity brief from 2019 to 2020. A summary of the students’ program was then presented by Peien Wang from University of Georgia. Student activities have been boosted by a strong lead from Peien and the active involvement of the student committee members. They helped with the continuing success of the mentor and mentee program, 1st launch of CAFPNA newsletter, website update and detailed preparation of our annual meeting, especially for the student competition. After that, Zengxin spoke about industry responses towards Covid, using his company as an example. Finally, we had the 2nd student presentation competition again this year, and the number of attendees this year increased to six compared to only four last year. Student committee chair, Peien Wang hosted the events, each competitor had 10 minutes for presentation and Q&A. Their presentation and award are listed below, and the competition was judged by the CAFPNA board members:

1st place:   Wenqian Wang, PhD Candidate, Poultry Science, University of Arkansas
Title: Application of Polydopamine Molecular Imprinted Polymer on a Localized Surface Plasmon Resonance Sensor for Detection of Multi-antibiotics in Chicken Meat
2nd place:  Xingyi Jiang, PhD Candidate, Florida State University
Title: Immunodetection of Meat Adulterants
3rd place:  Yafang Shen, PhD Candidate, Zhejiang University
Title: A Novel Optical Biosensor Based on Target-induced Immunomagnetic Beads Aggregation for Label-free and Portable Detection of Enrofloxacin 

Looking beyond 2020, CAFPNA will start with a renewed board member structure with new officers, please continue offering your support to our organization and activities:
President: Dr. Yifan Zhang, Wayne State University
President-Elect: Dr. Haiping Li, Merieux NutriSciences
Secretary: Dr. Ren Yang, Washington State University
Treasurer & Delegate: Zengxin “Scott” Li, Rich Products
Staff: Mingxia Zang, Flying Foods Group

Student committee chair: Jiewen Guan, Washington State University
Student committee vice-chairs:Peien Wang, University of Georgia; Wenqian Wang, University of Arkansas
Student committee members:Biyu Wu, University of Hawaii; Jingge Huang, Clemson University; Ivy Li, McGill University; Marti Hua, McGill University; Siman Liu, University of Florida; Yafang Shen, Zhejiang University; Yaxi Dai, University of Georgia; Yutong Wang, University of Guelph; Zhiying Wang, University of Alberta Zhuosheng Liu, University of California, Davis