English Speaking Working Group

Topics: Board | Meetings | Relationship Testing Workshop | Publications

The 2020 scientific meeting of the ESWG has been cancelled

Due to the Corona virus/Covid-19 situation we have decided to cancel this year’s ESWG scientific meeting in Oslo, Norway. This is sad of course, but we could not see how the meeting would be successful given the circumstances. We have chosen not to postpone the meeting but instead plan for a new scientific meeting in 2022. We will have an ESWG member meeting at the ISFG congress in Washington, 2021, where we will discuss and decide the host of the 2022 meeting. We are grateful for all the work that our colleagues in Oslo have done on the planning. We would also like to thank all planned workshop leaders, keynote speakers and participants that have registered, and hope that you will join our 2022 meeting! Furthermore, we aim for a webinar in the autumn to present and discuss the results from the ESWG proficiency testing program. More information will follow!

Summary of the ESWG 2019 member meeting

In connection to the ISFG conference in Prague, Czech Republic (September, 2019) the ESWG member meeting was held. Approximately 40 members were present at the meeting. In brief, the board was re-elected for another two years (Andreas Tillmar as the chairman, Denise Syndercombe Court as the secretary and Bo Thisted Simonsen as the treasurer). Daniel Kling presented a summary of this year's (2019) ESWG proficiency testing workshop. Daniel and colleagues will also organize the workshop 2020 (more information will come in the spring). Marguerethe Rødhammer Stenersen, Oslo, Norway presented a proposal for the 2020 ESWG scientific meeting. The board and the members present at the meeting agreed that the 2020 meeting should be hosted by Margurethe and colleagues.

Summary of the ESWG 2018 scientific meeting

The 2018 meeting of the English Speaking Working Group was held 12 September – 16 September 2018 at Hotel Vedensky, Saint Petersburg, Russia (http://www.eswg2018.org). The meeting was organized by Dr. Andrei Semikhodskii and colleagues. More than 80 participants from 25 different countries attended the meeting. The first days were devoted to six educational workshop of various forensic genetic topics like statistics in paternity and kinship analysis, DNA mixture interpretation, the use of non autosomal DNA markers, etc. The following days' scientific presentations covered topics such as STR sequence variation, use of MPS for kinship analysis, report from the relationship testing workshop and assessments of results from forensic genetic investigations. Some of the presentations are available for viewing. At the member meeting it was decided that the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH) will continue to organize the Relationship Testing Workshop also in 2019. We would like to thank Andrei Semikhodskii for organizing the successful meeting, not only the scientific part but also the social events such as the tour of the State Hermitage Museum and the dinner on the canals and rivers of St Petersburg.

Relationship Testing Workshop

The 2020 proficiency testing exercises (wet and paper challenge) will be organized by the Department of Forensic Sciences, Oslo University Hospital. More information will soon be available. For questions regarding the exercise, please contact Daniel Kling (daniel.kling@rmv.se).

Membership of the ESWG

Membership of the English Speaking Working Group (ESWG) is open to all English speaking members of the ISFG and may be obtained by application to the secretary of the group. There will be no membership fee in addition to that payable to the ISFG. Please go to your personal profile and tick membership of the ESWG.

Aims of the English Speaking Working Group are

• the exchange of experience, quality control and stimulation of cooperation between the members;
• making available scientific knowledge and findings in the field of interest;
• organisation of scientific meetings ­– but such meetings will be held only after consultation with the ISFG.

Here, you find the constitution of the ESWG.

History of the ESWG

The ESWG was founded after the ISFH meeting 23-27 September 1979 in London. Here you find some more details about the history of the ESWG.

Board

A board administers the ESWG that is responsible for organising any meeting of the group. The board consists of the chairman, the secretary and the treasurer who are elected by vote for a period of two years. The board represents the working group.

Chairman

Secretary

Treasurer

Publications of the Group

1. Syndercombe Court D, Lincoln P. A review of the 1991: 1994 Paternity Testing Workshops of the English-Speaking Working Group. In: Carracedo A, Brinkmann, Bär W (eds) Advances in Forensic Haemogenetics 6. Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg New York, pp. 683-5.
2. Bjerre A, Syndercombe Court D, Lincoln P, Morling N. A report of the 1995 and 1996 Paternity Testing Workshops of the English Speaking Working Group of the International Society for Forensic Haemogenetics. Forensic Sci Int 1997; 90: 41-55.
3. Hallenberg C, Morling N. A report of the 1997, 1998 and 1999 Paternity Testing Workshops of the English Speaking Working Group of the International Society for Forensic Genetics. Forensic Sci Int 2001; 116: 23-33.
4. Hallenberg C, Morling N. A report of the 2000 and 2001 Paternity Testing Workshops of the English Speaking Working Group of the International Society for Forensic Genetics. Forensic Sci Int 2002; 129: 43-50.
5. Thomsen AR, Hallenberg C, Simonsen BT, Langkjær RB, Morling N. A report of the 2002-2008 Paternity Testing Workshops of the English Speaking Working Group of the International Society for Forensic Genetics. FSI: Genetics 2009,3: 214-21.
6. Poulsen L, Friis SL, Hallenberg C, Simonsen BT, Morling N. A report of the 2009–2011 Paternity and Relationship Testing Workshops of the English Speaking Working Group of the International Society for Forensic Genetics. Forensic Science International: Genetics 2014; 9: e1-2.