The chairperson is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, elected or appointed by members of the group, presides over meetings of the group, conducts the group's business in an orderly fashion. In some organizations, the chairperson is known as president. In others, where a board appoints a president, the two terms are used for distinctly different positions. Terms for the office and its holder include chair, chairman, convenor, moderator and presiding officer; the chairperson of a parliamentary chamber is called the speaker. Chair has been used to refer to a office of authority since the middle of the 17th century. Chairman has been criticized as sexist. In World Schools Style debating, as of 2009, chair or chairperson refers to the person who controls the debate; the FranklinCovey Style Guide for Business and Technical Communication and the American Psychological Association style guide advocate using chair or chairperson.

The Oxford Dictionary of American Usage and Style suggested that the gender-neutral forms were gaining ground. The Telegraph style guide bans the use of chairperson; the National Association of Parliamentarians adopted a resolution in 1975 discouraging the use of chairperson and rescinded it in 2017. The word chair can refer to the place from which the holder of the office presides, whether on a chair, at a lectern, or elsewhere. During meetings, the person presiding is said to be "in the chair" and is referred to as "the chair". Parliamentary procedure requires that members address the "chair" as "Mr. Chairman" rather than using a name – one of many customs intended to maintain the presiding officer's impartiality and to ensure an objective and impersonal approach. In the British music hall tradition, the Chairman was the master of ceremonies who announced the performances and was responsible for controlling any rowdy elements in the audience; the role was popularised on British TV in the 1960s and 1970s by Leonard Sachs, the Chairman on the variety show The Good Old Days."Chairman" as a quasi-title gained particular resonance when socialist states from 1917 onward shunned more traditional leadership labels and stressed the collective control of soviets by beginning to refer to executive figureheads as "Chairman of the X Committee".

Vladimir Lenin, for example functioned as the head of Soviet Russia not as tsar or as president but in roles such as "Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the Russian SFSR". Mao Zedong was called "Chairman Mao", as he was Chairman of the Communist Party of China and Chairman of the Central Military Commission. In addition to the administrative or executive duties in organizations, the chairperson presides over meetings; such duties at meetings include: Calling the meeting to order Determining if a quorum is present Announcing the items on the order of business or agenda as they come up Recognition of members to have the floor Enforcing the rules of the group Putting questions to a vote, the usual way of resolving disagreements following discussion of the issues Adjourning the meetingWhile presiding, the chairperson should remain impartial and not interrupt a speaker if the speaker has the floor and is following the rules of the group. In committees or small boards, the chairperson votes along with the other members.

At a meeting, the chairperson only has one vote. The powers of the chairperson vary across organizations. In some organizations they have the authority to make financial decisions. In others they only makes recommendations to a board of directors, or may have no executive powers, in which case they are a spokesperson for the organization; the power given depends upon the type of organization, its structure, the rules it has created for itself. If the chairperson exceeds their authority, engages in misconduct, or fails to perform their duties, they may face disciplinary procedures; such procedures may include suspension, or removal from office. The rules of the organization would provide details on who can perform these disciplinary procedures. Whoever appointed or elected the chairperson has the power to discipline them. There are three common types of chairperson in public corporations; the CEO may hold the title of chairperson, in which case the board names an independent member of the board as a lead director.

This position is equivalent to the position of président-directeur général in France. Executive chairperson is an office separate from that of CEO, where the titleholder wields influence over company operations, such as Larry Ellison of Oracle, Douglas Flint of HSBC and Steve Case of the former AOL Time Warner. In particular, the group chair of HSBC is considered the top position of that institution, outranking the chief executive, is responsible for leading the board and representing the company in meetings with government figures. Before the creation of the group management

Nandini Satpathy was an Indian politician and author. She was the Chief Minister of Odisha from June 1972 to December 1976. Satpathy was born on 9 June 1931 and grew up in Pithapur, India, she was the eldest daughter of Kalindi Charan Panigrahi. At the age of eight in year 1939 she had been mercilessly beaten up by British Police for pulling down the Union Jack as well as for pasting hand written anti British Raj posters on the walls of Cuttack; the same was discussed and the same had worked as fuel in the fire for the struggle of Freedom of India from British Raj. While at Ravenshaw College pursuing her Master of Arts in Odia, she got involved with the Communist Party's student wing, the Student Federation. In 1951, a student protest movement began in Odisha against rising college education costs, it turned into a national youth movement. Satpathy was a leader of this movement, police lathi charged the protestors and Nandini Satpathy was injured in the sane, she was jailed, along with many others.

In the jail she met Devendra Satpathy, another Student Federation member and the man who she married. (He was elected for two terms to the lower house from Dhenkanal. In 1962, the Congress party was dominant in Orissa. At a national level, there was a movement to have more women representatives in the Indian Parliament; the Assembly elected Satpathy to the upper house of India's Parliament. After Indira Gandhi became Prime Minister of India in 1966, Satpathy became a Minister attached to the Prime Minister, with her specific portfolio being the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. Satpathy returned to Odisha in 1972, due to vacancies caused by Biju Patnaik and others departing from the Congress party, became the Chief Minister of Odisha. During the Emergency of 25 June 1975 – 21 March 1977, she imprisoned a number of notable individuals, including Nabakrusna Choudhuri and Rama Devi. Satpathy left office in December 1976. During the general election in 1977, she was part of a group of protesters led by Jagjivan Ram, which became the Congress for Democracy party.

Satpathy returned to the Congress party on the request of Rajiv Gandhi. The Congress party was unpopular in Odisha as a whole, due to its two term miss rule, she was elected as a member of the State Legislative Assembly from Gondia and remained in the Assembly until 2000, when she decided to retire from politics. She was critical of the Odisha branch of the Congress party. In 1977, Satpathy was accused of corruption and a police investigation started into possible violations of the Prevention of Corruption Act in force at that time. During the investigation, she was interrogated on a number of questions in written form, she refused to answer any questions. The court agreed, strengthening the rights of the accused with a recognition of the right to a lawyer and the right against self-incrimination. Over the next 18 years, Satpathy won all of the cases against her. Satpathy was a writer in the Odia language, she received the 1998 Sahitya Bharati Samman Award for her contributions to Oriya literature.

Her last major literary work was translating Taslima Nasreen's Lajja into Oriya. She died on 4 August 2006 at her home in Bhubaneswar. In 2006 a social cause organisation, the Srimati Nandini Satpathy Memorial Trust, was established in her memory, it is one of the leading social cause organisations of Odisha albeit India. Her younger out of the two sons Tathagata Satpathy was a 4 time Member of Parliament from Biju Janata Dal and the editor of daily newspapers — Dharitri and OrissaPOST. 9 June, the birthday of late Smt. Nandini Satpathy, has been declared as National Daughters' Day - Nandini Diwas. Nandini and Diwas are two Sanskrit words which mean daughter and day, respectively.7th National Daughters day was celebrated in 2013 and Governor of Rajashthan was the chief guest in the event. "Smt. Nandini Satpathy Memorial Trust". Retrieved 9 May 2012. "Nandini Diwas'12". Orissa Diary. Smt. Nandini Satpathy Memorial Trust Notable personalities of Odisha as per the Govt. of Odisha official web site

Dup15q syndrome is the common name for chromosome 15q11.2-q13.1 duplication syndrome. This is a neurodevelopmental disorder, caused by the partial duplication of Chromosome 15, that confers a strong risk for autism spectrum disorder and intellectual disability, it is the most common genetic cause of autism, accounting for 1-3% of cases. Dup15q syndrome includes both interstitial duplications and isodicentric duplications of 15q11.2-13.1. Important genes involved in the etiology of Dup15q syndrome include UBE3A, GABRA5, GABRB3, GABRG3. UBE3A is a ubiquitin-protein ligase, involved in targeting proteins for degradation and plays an important role in synapse function. GABRA5, GABRB3, GABRG3 are gamma aminobutyric acid type A receptor subunit genes and are important in Dup15q syndrome given the established role of GABA in the etiologies of autism and epilepsy. Genetic testing methods such as fluorescence in situ hybridization and chromosomal microarray are available for diagnosing Dup15q syndrome and similar genetic disorders.

With the increase in genetic testing availability, more duplications outside of the 15q11.2-13.1 region are being diagnosed. The global chromosome 15q11.2-13.1 duplication syndrome specific groups only provide medical information and research for chromosome 15q11.2-13.1 duplication syndrome and not the outlying 15q duplications. Individuals with Dup15q syndrome are at high risk for epilepsy and intellectual disability. Motor impairments are common in individuals with the disorder. Rates of epilepsy in children with isodicentric duplications are higher than in children with interstitial duplications. A majority of patients with either duplication type have a history of gastrointestinal problems. A study at the University of California, Los Angeles of 13 children with Dup15q syndrome and 13 children with nonsyndromic ASD found that, compared to children with nonsyndromic autism, children with Dup15q had lower autism severity as measured by the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule. However, children with Dup15q syndrome had greater motor impairment and impairment of daily living skills than children in the nonsyndromic ASD group.

Within the Dup15q syndrome cohort, children with epilepsy had greater cognitive impairment. Dup15q syndrome is caused by copy number variation in which extra copies of certain genes are present in the genome. Two duplication types are described in Dup15q syndrome and isodicentric. Interstitial duplications are partial trisomies and features these extra gene copies on the Chromosome 15 alongside the "original" copies. Isodicentric duplications are partial tetrasomies and feature an extranumerary chromosome that contains the extra genes. Many important genes in the 15q11.2-13.1 region play crucial roles in the etiology of Dup15q syndrome. UBE3A has been associated with autism, it is involved in protein degradation via the ubiquitin pathway and plays an important role in synaptic functioning. GABRA5, GABRB3, GABRG3 encode the α5, β3, γ3 subunits of GABAA receptors, respectively; because GABA is the principal inhibitory neurotransmitter of the human brain, it is that duplications of these GABAA receptor genes affect or disrupt inhibitory neural transmission in Dup15q syndrome.

Patients with Dup15q syndrome feature a distinctive electroencephalography signature or biomarker in the form of high amplitude spontaneous beta frequency oscillations. This EEG signature was first noted as a qualitative pattern in clinical EEG readings and was described quantitatively by researchers at the UCLA and their collaborators within the network of national Dup15q clinics; this group of researchers found that beta activity in children with Dup15q syndrome is greater than that observed in healthy developing children of the same age and children of the same age and IQ with autism not caused by a known genetic disorder. The EEG signature appears identical to beta oscillations induced by benzodiazepine drugs that modulate GABAA receptors, suggesting that the signature is driven by overexpression of duplicated GABAA receptor genes GABRA5, GABRB3, GABRG3. Treatment monitoring and identification of molecular disease mechanisms may be facilitated by this biomarker. Dup15q Alliance is an advocacy organization in the United States for families affected by the disorder.

The organization holds biannual family conferences to bring together families, as well as annual science conferences to bring together Dup15q syndrome researchers from around the world. Dup15q Alliance Idic15 Canada Idic15 Spain