HPLC 2025 Hits Bruges

The 54th International Symposium on High Performance Liquid Phase Separations and Related Techniques (HPLC 2025) will be held from Sunday through Thursday, 15–19 June 2025, in Bruges, Belgium. LCGC International spoke to the Scientific Committee to find out what’s in store.

Q. HPLC 2025 will be held in Bruges, Belgium, from 15–19 June 2025. Summer seems a long time away, but the opening ceremony will be soon be here. Are there any deadlines on the horizon that delegates, speakers, sponsors, and exhibitors should be aware of?

A: Yes. The three main deadlines are 15 January 2025 (oral abstract submission); 1 April (not a joke!) for poster abstracts; and 24 April to benefit from the early-bird registration fees. We plan to have the oral programme out by 24 March. Other dates of interest can be found at: https://hplc2025-bruges.org/

Q. Does HPLC 2025 have a value that is distinct from that of other conferences?

A: European HPLC editions are usually considered as the main show for liquid chromatography (LC), with a large exhibition and a significant crowd of 1200+ delegates. This makes the HPLC conferences the best venue for learning about the newest technologies in high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and related techniques, and for networking with other scientists.

Q. What are you most excited about for the HPLC 2025 conference? What do you want to achieve?

A: We are pretty excited about all the initiatives we are rolling out to be of maximum service to our industry-affiliated delegates. We do this because we see academic research in chromatography advancing more slowly than in the past, while the number of HPLC professionals in industry keeps growing. And the number of chromatography practitioners who did not receive their primary training in chromatography and separation science is growing at an ever greater pace. We therefore believe the HPLC conference series can be a unique place where chemical analysts active in industry can expand their chromatographic knowledge, learn about new automation and data processing methods, and, above all, learn from each other’s experiences.

A new initiative to facilitate this is the organization of dedicated “Industry Stories” sessions, showcasing the most interesting examples of problem solving in industry. In these sessions, we will not only welcome the typical success reports but also encourage presenters to reveal the mistakes made (if any) and the challenges and setbacks faced. Next, we will also have dedicated oral presentation sessions on sustainability, lab and workflow automation (including a session on “The Intelligent Instrument”), data processing, and preparative chromatography.

Another cornerstone in the industry‑oriented part of the programme will be a plenary debate session on the current challenges and future opportunities for HPLC analysis in industry. To maximize interest, this debate session will use the views and concerns spawned by the participants of a dedicated industry leadership track and those collected beforehand among the regular conference delegates.

Q. Is there anything else new or different in the programme of HPLC 2025?

A: With the programme in Bruges we also would like to give full credit to the “Related Techniques” extension in the official name of the HPLC conference series because liquid chromatography is seldom the only separation technique in the analyst’s toolbox. We will therefore also offer the broadest platform, involving dedicated sessions and tutorials, to related separation sciences such as preparative chromatography, supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC), gas chromatography (GC), and field-flow fractionation
(FFF) and related particle separation techniques.

Important emerging topics that will be emphasized via short courses and tutorials will be lab and workflow sustainability, machine learning, asymmetric flow field‑flow fractionation (AF4) for bioparticle separations, adeno-associated virus characterization, and data processing.

Q. Can you tell us more about the plenary speakers?

A: Our desire to offer our industrial participants the strongest possible programme is also reflected in our choice of plenary speakers for the opening ceremony on Sunday. Koen Sandra leads a company active in high-end chromatographic problem‑solving, and will kick-off the conference with a didactic and visionary talk about the very timely topic of mRNA structural characterization. Our second plenary opener will be Kerstin Thurow. She heads the Centre for Life Science Automation (CELISCA) and will be talking about current developments and future perspectives in analytical laboratory automation.

Q. What aspects of the conference will be of value to young scientists?

A: For the young scientists we have the prestigious Csaba Horvath Young Scientist Award competition, as well as two different general poster presentation competitions and the more fun HPLC tube and slam competitions. These will be scheduled in one dynamic session with maximal audience participation.

For the young (and not so young) talents seeking to explore new horizons,
a speed‑date job fair with participation from all leading companies will be organized and complemented by a workshop on career opportunities in industry and academia.

Alongside this, we will also offer a rich selection of short courses and tutorials taught by top-level scientists and covering both some fundamental basics as well as the most timely topics in the field.

Q. How important are poster presentations at HPLC 2025? Are you doing anything new to increase visibility of posters?

A: Absolutely. Inspired by an idea proposed by Jiri Urban, we will schedule the poster sessions in two 3-h-long sessions without anything else going on in the programme. As posters will be on display during the entire duration of the conference, this format will allow us to offer poster presenters two occasions to present their work.

To turn the poster sessions into a buzzing affair, we will for the first time organize them as “Poster & Exhibitor fests”, stimulating interactions between poster presenters and the exhibitors. This will be done by pairing poster abstracts with the key words describing the activities of the exhibitors

To further emphasize the importance of poster presentations, we will also have two separate main competitions. The first, the “Poster Presentation Competition”, will award prizes to the posters that showcase innovative work in a clear, engaging manner and are presented with competence and enthusiasm during one-on-one interactions with the jury. The second, the “Poster Pitch Competition”, will recognize those who can best “sell” the work in their poster in a 5-min pitch talk. Admission to the latter competition will be based on abstract reviews, with results communicated ahead of the conference.

Alongside this, we will encourage our sponsors and exhibitors to sponsor topical poster awards. One such initiative is an award for the poster contributing most to making chromatographic analysis more sustainable.

Q. In today’s digital world—particularly given the many virtual events held since the start of the pandemic—do you think people need to be convinced of the value of attending an in-person scientific meeting?

A: Our own personal experience is that networking is key in a scientific career and that the contacts you establish when presenting a poster, when discussing or meeting up with colleagues, or when speaking with the exhibitors are usually at least as valuable as what can be learned during the lectures. Being very well aware of this, we will invest in good lounge and meeting areas (including a pop-up bar) to facilitate interactions outside of the lecture rooms. And of course, with a team of co-chairs rooted in the organization of the HTC conference series, known for its generous hospitality, we can guarantee we will provide good catering and an attractive social programme to facilitate networking.

Q. Putting together a large conference is a lot of work. How will you judge if it was a success?

A: This is an easy one: when we see happy faces on all our participants and exhibitors. The HPLC conference series has been crucial in the academic career of all five members of our chair team, hence we all feel the urge to give something in return. In a more formal way, we also plan a participant survey after the end of the conference, which can then be used by future HPLC conference organizers.

Q. Anything else participants should be aware of?

A: Bruges has a large array of hotels and airbnb stays, including several youth hostels. However, Bruges is also a very popular tourist destination, so we advise people to book their stay as early as possible. Another point of attention is that the opening ceremony on Sunday will not be held in the conference centre but in Bruges’ splendid and majestic Concert Hall. Travel instructions to assist in reaching Bruges by train from Brussels airport and Brussels train station will be put on the website in due course.

Gert Desmet is a Full Professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium.

Deirdre Cabooter is a Full Professor at KU Leuven, Belgium.

Pat Sandra is a Honorary Chair.

Sebastiaan Eeltink is a Full Professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium.

Ken Broeckhoven is an Associate Professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium.

Frederic Lynen is a Full Professor at Ghent University, Belgium.