The conference landscape of selenium research: A brief history, global structure, and stewardship

The chemical element selenium is a main group element with some commonality to sulfur but with exquisite chemistry and biology that are still being figured out to this day. It was discovered to be a trace element essential to human health and is found in the enzyme active sites of Glutathione Peroxidases (GPX) and Thioredoxin Reductases (TXNRD). There is interest in using this element in chemistry by monitoring it in human health, as well as gauging its prevalence in the environment and agriculture. Selenium continues to warrant study from a wide perspective including chemistry, biochemistry, and its role in health and diseases. In this article, we consider the five main conference series that continue to bring selenium (and trace element) researchers together. We provide a history and clarify the five different conference series by making a graphical analogy to metro lines and their occasionally shared stations. We suggest color coding for , , , , and. was renamed We list keywords and concepts such as health, environment, chemistry, and synthetic chemistry etc. The Selenium conferences are flourishing thanks to a relatively small group of dedicated practitioners who devote effort, not only on preparing "hard currency" journal manuscripts but also on event organization and stewardship. This article includes a table of all previous locations and dates spanning 55 years of meetings along with additional pertinent information. There are three tables and three figures. A call is made for continued leadership in the selenium field, and recognition is given to those who are currently dedicating themselves.