The SNG: A Brief History

Originally constituted as the Scottish Electrophysiological Society (SES), of which I was Postgraduate Committee member during my PhD in St Andrews in the early 80’s, the Scottish Neuroscience Group (SNG) replaced SES in 1986 to acknowledge the ever-broadening neuroscience remit of its members. At that time, the SNG Secretary was Bob Pitman in St Andrews, and the Treasurer was Peter Fraser in Aberdeen. After I returned to St Andrews in 1988 following 5 years of postdoctoral research at the University of Bristol, I took over the combined role of Secretary and Treasurer of the SNG at the invitation of Bob Pitman. The SNG bank account was duly moved to St Andrews in 1990, and I remained its custodian until Ilary Allodi took over in 2025.

The SNG meeting in 1991 was held in Dundee and included several notable dignitaries. The first speaker, for example, would later become a Fellow of the Royal Society, a Knight of the Realm and was the Principal of Dundee University for more than a decade. Presenting at the SNG was clearly influential in his career development! Note, the talks were almost all 30 minutes long (the special guest lecturer was allowed 45 minutes) and delivered by well-established scientists. There were also poster sessions, an important component of the SNG meeting that continues to this day. At the end there was a business meeting when we made decisions about the following year – venue, format, costs etc. My notes for that meeting indicate that I proposed to double the costs to £5 for students and £10 for everyone else – still, not bad value considering that lunch, teas and coffees was included! The SNG meeting remains outstanding value for money, and this is only made possible by the generous support we have received over the years from our sponsors to cover costs.

In 1999 I was elected Head of the new and very large School of Biology at St Andrews. Regrettably, due to the pressures of the position, the SNG fell into abeyance for a few years; I was drowning in problem solving of a non-scientific nature. Then, quite unexpectedly, in 2003, I received an email from Professor Barry Jacobs at Princeton, world famous for his seminal work on the serotonin system. The email read something like:

“Keith, we have never met but, like you, I work of serotonin so why don’t you organise a serotonin symposium in St Andrews, then I can visit with my buddies and play golf on the famous Old Course”.

So, I did! By then I was getting the hang of the Headship and with the encouragement and support of Jerry Lambert, we organised the symposium which took place in the historic Senate Rooms in St Andrews. Barry’s buddies included George Richerson from Yale (now Iowa), who later returned to deliver the SNG plenary lecture at Strathclyde in 2010. I also invited some local neuroscientists and SNG stalwarts from Dundee.

The outcome of that ad hoc symposium was the resurrection of an annual SNG meeting, but along with some significant format changes. Firstly, the meeting would take place on the last Friday of August. Why? Easy to remember! Also, it helps to facilitate attendance – the end of the summer, before the start of the Semester and few if any clashes with other neuroscience meetings. Secondly, it would no longer rely on a single individual to carry the full burden of its organization; the idea was to form a new Committee whose members included me as Secretary and Treasurer and an SNG representative from each of the Scottish universities who would act as local organiser. Thirdly, the venue would rotate around the country in alphabetical order – Aberdeen, Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow, St Andrews and Strathclyde. Heriot Watt was later incorporated with the enthusiastic support of Euan Brown and colleagues. The first Heriot Watt meeting took place in 1999, co-organised by Euan and Jane Haley from Edinburgh. Fourthly, the emphasis shifted to more, shorter talks, given by younger neuroscientists, the new kids on the block, if you will. In particular, PhD students would have an opportunity deliver a talk on their work, perhaps their first presentation, to a friendly, supportive audience and receive valuable feedback on their research. Finally, the meeting would culminate a plenary speaker, chosen by the host Institution to reflect its research focus and hopefully boost local attendance.

The 2025 meeting in Dundee was the first to break with that tradition with the inaugural Keith Sillar lecture - fortunately not a posthumous accolade and one I was extremely honoured by! - chosen by yours truly at the request of the Committee and delivered by Dave McLean, who recently returned to Scotland as a new Professor at the University of Edinburgh. However, the overarching principle of the SNG meeting has remained similar to this day - a one-day, low-cost affair aimed at bringing together Scottish neuroscientists to discuss new data and to forge new collaborations and friendships. I hope and trust that it will continue to prosper and develop in the future.