Meetings of Bergey's International Society for Microbial Systematics (BISMiS) are generally held once in two years. Till date, four meetings of BISMiS have taken place with the first one in China, followed by Scotland, India and most recently in South Africa. For the fifth meeting we are returning to China.

See below for details on these meetings (in reverse chronology).

The Fifth meeting of BISMiS - Microbial Systematics in the Meta-data Era – Opportunities and Challenges was hosted by Sun-Yat Sen University at the Baiyun International Convention Centre, situated in the city of Guangzhou, China on 6-9 November 2023. The meeting was organised by Wen-Jun Li and was attended by over 800 registered participants from 32 different countries. The Opening Address was delivered by Jianguo Xu on "Reverse microbial etiolog". William Whitman was awarded the Bergey's Medal.

Program and abstract book is available as a single PDF file here. To watch photos from the meeting, please click here.

The Fourth meeting of BISMiS - Capturing species diversity was hosted by the University of Pretoria at the Misty Hills Conference Centre, situated close to the Cradle of Humankind in the city of Muldersdrift, South Africa on 8-11 April 2018. The meeting was organised by Stephanus Venter. It was attended by 48 registered participants from 14 different countries. The Opening Address was delivered by Ramon Rossello-Mora on "A need for taxonomists to take actions before its too late". Jongsik Chun was awarded the Bergey's Medal.

Program and abstract book is available as a single PDF file here.

The Third meeting of BISMiS - Microbial Systematics and Metagenomics was held in the city of Pune, the cultural capital of the state of Maharashtra, India on 12-15 September 2016 at the Microbial Culture Collection (MCC) during the region's most revered festival, the 10-day Ganeshotsav. The meeting was Convened by Kamlesh Jangid and Co-Chaired by Brian Austin and Yogesh Shouche. It was attended by 86 registered participants from 15 different countries. The "BISMiS 2016 - a souvenir" comprising a collection of chapters written specifically for the students and faculty in academia was released at the meeting (PDF Available here). The Opening Address was delivered by Peter Kaempfer on "Taxonomy of Prokaryotes - New Challenges in a Global World". Brian Austin was awarded the Bergey's Medal.

A detailed report of the meeting was published in The Microbial Taxonomist, Vol. 8, issue 2. Program and abstracts are available as a PDF file here and here, respectively.

The Second meeting of BISMiS - Defining Microbial Diversity in the Genomic Era was held at the historic city of Edinburgh, Scotland at the Apex International Hotel on 7-10 April 2014. The meeting was Co-Chaired by Fred Rainey and Brian Austin. The recipient of the 2014 Bergey's Award, Hans-Peter Klenk, also delivered the keynote presentation entitled "The genomic encyclopedia of Bacteria and Archaea project and its use for microbial taxonomy".

A detailed report of the meeting was published in The Bulletin of BISMiS, Vol. 5, part 1. Program and abstracts are available as a PDF file here and here, respectively.

The INAUGURAL MEETING of Bergey's International Society for Microbial Systematics (BISMiS) - Microbial Systematics: Concepts, Practices and Recent Advances was held at the Friendship Hotel Beijing, China, on 19-23 May 2011. The meeting was sponsored by Bergey's Manual Trust and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The program committee chaired by Lixin Zhang with Co-Chairs, Guoping Zhao, Li Huang and Zixin Deng worked closely with Michael Goodfellow, the Trustees and others to organize the program. More than 350 scientists and students attended the meeting, which had sessions on all aspects of microbial systematics. Nobel Laureate Barry Sharpless delivered the keynote speech entitled "Click Chemistry Evolving - Destinations Unknown" and Antonio Ventosa delivered his Bergey Award address entitled "Halophilic Microorganisms and Hypersaline Environments".

A detailed report of the meeting was published in The Bulletin of BISMiS, Vol. 2, part 1. Program and abstracts are available as a PDF file here.