The 90th American Malacological Society meeting will be held jointly with the 57th meeting of the Western Society of Malacology (WSM) and the 7th International Heterobranch Workshop (IHW). Our joint meeting will take place from 4-7 August 2024 in Los Angeles, California at the Hilton Pasadena hotel and conference center.

The meeting will open the evening of 4 August with a welcome reception on the hotel’s outdoor patio during registration. Each day will have a morning symposium with invited speakers. The topic of the AMS President's Symposium (5 August) will be “Molluscs in symbiosis: mechanisms and diversity.” A symposium hosted by WSM (6 August) will feature research on the ecology and evolution of terrestrial molluscs. Finally, the IHW will host a symposium (7 August) on marine heterobranchs. The meeting will also include a symposium on molluscs in education and outreach, focusing on work using molluscs to convey science to diverse student groups and indigenous communities. This is being organized by the Society’s Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) Committee and will feature invited speakers and a panel discussion, and a hosted lunch for students pending sponsorship of the event.

Each day will also feature contributed oral presentations, with a poster session on the evening of 5 August; talks are expected to span diverse sub-disciplines of malacology including advances in genomics, phylogenetics, ecology and conservation. Contributed oral presentations will be 15 minutes including time for questions. Please plan your actual presentation to be completed in 12 minutes to allow plenty of time for questions and transitions between speakers. Posters should be in landscape orientation and no larger than 48" X 36". The deadline for submission of abstracts for posters and talks is 21 June.

We will be holding the annual AMS Auction (on 6 August), a favorite of many AMS attendees. We thank members in advance for their generosity– please consider donating items for auction, or overpaying outrageously to support travel and research awards for AMS student members! Items submitted for auction can be anything mollusc-related (e.g., books, art, trinkets, etc.) but cannot include shells or other specimens. Items for auction could also include services; be creative! You could donate your time through e.g., scientific illustration, a tutorial/training session on a skill in your area of expertise, or even manuscript review or copy editing. Please contact Patrick Krug (pkrug@calstatela.edu) if you plan to make a donation, even if you will bring it to the meeting. Otherwise, you can ship donations ahead of the meeting to: Patrick Krug, Dept. of Biology, 5151 State University Dr., LA, CA, 90032-8201. For services or non-tangible items, please send Pat a written description for the auction.

The meeting will close with a banquet on the evening of 7 August at the venue, which is included with any full meeting registration; additional banquet tickets can be reserved in advance for guests for an additional $75.

Please join us in Los Angeles! The Pasadena Hilton venue is located about 25 miles from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). A block of rooms is reserved at the Hilton, but there are many other hotels nearby in addition to other options for accommodations through vacation home rental websites. Additional information about AMS 2024 can be found on the AMS website or by contacting Patrick Krug (pkrug@calstatela.edu).