Edited by Feifei Wei, Biometrics Section Publications Officer

The Biometrics Section would like to thank Jianwen Cai for her excellent service during the past year. She will assume the past chair position as Mike Daniels becomes chair in 2014 and Diana Miglioretti becomes chair-elect. We also wish to thank Council of Sections representative Page Moore, whose role will now be taken by Joe Hogan.

The Biometrics Section is pleased to sponsor the following invited sessions at the Joint Statistical Meetings, August 2–7 in Boston, Massachusetts:

• Statistical Methods for Modern Complex-Structured Imaging Data, organized by Veera Baladandayuthapani of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center
• Recent Developments in the Analysis of Semi-Competing Risks Data, organized by Sebastien Haneuse of the Harvard School of Public Health
• Recent Development in Variable Selection Methods, organized by Zhangsheng Yu of the Indiana University School of Medicine
• Emerging Statistical Methods for Complex Data, organized by Lan Xue of Oregon State University
• New Challenges in Survival Analysis, organized by Yichuan Zhao of Georgia State University

Abstract submissions for contributed and topic-contributed ativan online pharmacy papers will be accepted online until February 3. See the JSM 2014 website for more information.

Topic-contributed sessions are a nice alternative to contributed sessions because they are organized around a central topic, the talks are longer (20 minutes, rather than 15), and one can have discussants as well as speakers. Sessions consist of five participants (e.g., four speakers and one discussant or three speakers and two discussants).

Those interested in organizing a topic-contributed session should notify the 2014 JSM Biometrics Section chair, Jonathan Schildcrout, at jonathan.schildcrout@vanderbilt.edu. They also must submit a proposal online by January 15. See the JSM 2014 website for instructions on organizing and submitting a topic-contributed session.

Also consider proposing a topic-contributed panel session. Panel sessions have 3–6 panelists, and the session submission format involves one abstract for all speakers. Note that if each speaker wishes to provide an abstract, speak on a specific topic, and submit an individual paper for JSM Proceedings, then the session should be a paper session.