Welcome message from the ESCAN2022 organizers
We are very happy to welcome you to ESCAN 2022 in Vienna, and to provide a time and space where the ESCAN community can finally meet and interact in person again. We are particularly pleased to welcome about 350 registered participants from more than 30 nations, including many European countries, but also numerous attendees from overseas. An exciting scientific program is awaiting us over the three days of the conference: 3 keynote lectures, 27 submitted symposia and 115 oral presentations and, last but not least, more than 100 posters. In planning the conference, we have tried to address some of the things that the pandemic has taught us over the last two years. First, we need to see, talk and connect to each other more than ever. That’s why we have kept the cost of the conference as low as possible, in order to allow many of us but especially the early career researchers to travel to Vienna and meet in person again – after a long time of being constrained to virtual interactions. At the same time, we know that traveling has a tremendous impact on the environment.
Therefore, we aimed to reduce the environmental impact of the conference as much as possible (see https://www. escan2022.eu/general-information/sustainability/ for more info).
There will not be any printed program. Everything that is essential for a worthwhile conference experience will be provided online and easily accessible, including from your phone. We also decided against the usual goodies handed out by sponsors or organizers – mostly, they would end up in the garbage bin anyways. As we cannot make an inpat alone, we also count on the collaboration of each one of you: therefore, you will be given a reusable cup from the local startup mycoffeecup for the beverages served at the complimentary coffee breaks. Please bring this cup with you to the conference, and re-use it all five coffee breaks. You can keep the cup after the conference, and continue using it back home – or return it. With this small action we will be able to avoid the waste of up to 3000 single use cups! Finally, we will compensate the carbon emissions caused by the local activities of the conference to a large extent, and would like to ask you to consider doing the same for your travel-related emissions.
We hope you will enjoy the conference, and that you look forward as much as we do to meet in person at the opening reception in the Vienna City Hall, and of course at the conference itself.
Giorgia Silani & Claus Lamm, on behalf of the ESCAN 2022 organizing team from the University of Vienna (Emilio Chiappini, Helena Hartmann, Claudia Massaccesi, Isabella Wagner, and many other volunteers that supported us)