The Annual General Meeting was held at the ecsite conference in Porto, Portugal today, with the announcement of a new president, Herbert Münder.

Making a fight against the proliferation of 'alternative facts' and the rise of the 'post-truth' era central to his aims as Ecsite president, Münder said: "For me, one of the most important roles will be the clarification of scientific facts in times of fake news."

That means uniting the field of science communication and science centres to help enable visitors to be more informed and active in public debate, he said.

Münder is the general manager at Universum Bremen science centre in Germany and is also past president of Eusea, the European Science Events Association, and current president of MINTaktiv, Germany's science museum network.

Münder, who has been a member of the Ecsite board since 2014, takes the reins from outgoing president Michiel Buchel.

Buchel's legacy from his two-year term as president includes a rethink of the organisation's membership structure, allowing many more institutions to join as fully fledged members.

"I'm very happy that my initiative to open up the membership for many more institutions to become full members received such great support," said Buchel. "Full members used to be the minority with most of the rights. Now, they have become the majority. This is more democratic and will bring more engagement and exciting new ideas from all over Europe."