The Heart of Europe Bio-Crystallography Meeting (short HEC-Meeting) is an annual academic conference on structural biology, in particular protein crystallography. Researchers from universities, other research institutions and industry from Austria, Czech Republic, Germany and Poland meet to present and discuss current topics of their research. The talks are predominantly given by PhD students (doctoral students). An exception is the invited HEC lecture, which is held by a renowned scientist of the research field. The format of the HEC meeting has been adopted from the eleven years older Rhine-Knee Regional Meeting on Structural Biology ().
History of the HEC-Meeting The HEC-Meeting dates back to an initiative in the year 1998 of Manfred Weiss and Rolf Hilgenfeld, who were researchers at the Institute for Molecular Biotechnology (IMB) in Jena and intended to establish a meeting format similar to the Rhine-Knee Regional Meeting on Structural Biology () in the New Länder.Mariusz Jaskolski und Michal M. Sikorski: 15 Years of Heart of Europe bio-Crystallography Meetings – Reminiscences. Poznan 2013, Both conferences are regional meetings of German scientists together with scientific research groups of the neighbouring countries. Nine groups from Germany (the new states and West-Berlin), Poland and Czech Republic participated in the first HEC-Meeting from 8 to 10 October 1998. Later also groups from Austria and the Old Federal States participated. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, no meeting was organized in 2020 and HEC-23 took place as an online meeting.
Former HEC-Meetings: Meeting year location organiser participants HEC-lecture Weblink HEC-1 1998 Eisenberg, Germany R. Hilgenfeld, M. Weiss, IMB Jena 41 - DGK-Mitteilungen, vol. 18 (1999), https://dgk-home.de/veroeffentlichungen/mitteilungen/ HEC-2 1999 Lübben, Germany U. Heinemann, Y. Muller, MDC Berlin 53 V. Lamzin IUCr Newsletter vol. 7, no. 3, http://www.iucr.org/news/newsletter/volume-7/number-3/deep-in-the-heart-of-europe HEC-3 2000 Poznań, Poland M. Jaskolski, CBB Poznan 53 G. Sheldrick Webpage,IUCr Newsletter, vol. 8, no. 4, http://www.iucr.org/news/newsletter/volume-8/number-4/biocrystallography-meeting HEC-4 2001 Bedřichov, Czech Republic J. Sedlacek, IMG Prague 48 Z. Otwinowski IUCr Newsletter vol. 10, no. 1, http://www.iucr.org/news/newsletter/volume-10/number-1/heart-of-europe HEC-5 2002 Goslar, Germany D. Heinz, GBF Brunswick 68 A. Yonath HEC-6 2003 Wittenberg, Germany S. König, M. Stubbs, MLU Halle 113 T. Bergfors HEC-7 2004 Krzyżowa, Poland M. Bochtler, IIMCB Warsaw 101 A. Wlodawer HEC-8 2005 Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic J. Sedlacek, IMG Prague 101 Z. Dauter IUCr Newsletter, vol. 13, no.4, http://www.iucr.org/news/newsletter/volume-13/number-4/heart-of-europe HEC-9 2006 Teistungenburg, Germany R. Ficner, Univ. Göttingen 128 E. Garman Webpage HEC-10 2007 Będlewo, Poland M. Jaskolski, CBB Poznan 116 G. Dodson Webpage HEC-11 2008 Greifswald, Germany W. Hinrichs, Univ. Greifswald 102 P. Nissen HEC-12 2009 Třešť, Czech Republic P. Rezacova, IMG Prag 107 P. Emsley Webpage,IUCr Newsletter, vol. 18., no. 3, http://www.iucr.org/news/newsletter/volume-18/number-3/12th-heart-of-europe-meeting HEC-13 2010 Schöneck/Vogtl., Germany N. Sträter, Leipzig University 107 A. Popov Webpage,DGK AK1 Newsletter https://www.uni-leipzig.de/~straeter/newsletter/AK1_newsletter_2010_12.html HEC-14 2011 Żagań, Poland M. Jaskolski, CBB/PTPS Poznan 101 Z. Derewenda Webpage HEC-15 2012 Beilngries, Germany Y. Muller, Univ. Erlangen 93 B. Rupp Webpage HEC-16 2013 St Georgen im Attergau, Austria K. Djinovic-Carugo, Univ. Vienna 114 P. Tompa Webpage,DGK Mitteilungen, vol. 44, p. 92, 2014, https://dgk-home.de/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/DGK-44.pdfIUCr Newsletter, vol. 22, no. 2, http://www.iucr.org/news/newsletter/volume-22/number-2/MR-HEC16.pdf HEC-17 2014 Akademie Berlin-Schmöckwitz, Germany M. Weiss, U. Müller, HZB Berlin 134 G. Klebe Webpage ,IUCr Newsletter vol. 22, no. 4, http://www.iucr.org/news/newsletter/volume-22/number-4/hec-17 HEC-18 2015 Kutná Hora, Czech Republic J. Dohnálek, IBT Prague 120 R. Read Webpage HEC-19 2016 Warberg, Germany W. Blankenfeldt, A. Scrima, HZI Brunswick 119 I. Schlichting Webpage HEC-20 2017 Wojanów Palace, Poland M. Bochtler, M. Nowotny, IIMCB Warsaw 112 T. Clausen Webpage HEC-21 2018 Quedlinburg, Germany M. Stubbs, MLU Halle 126 M. Rossmann Webpage HEC-22 2019 Obergurgl, Austria K. Scheffzek, Med. Univ. Innsbruck 122 V. Ramakrishnan Webpage ,IUCr Newsletter vol. 27, no. 4, https://www.iucr.org/news/newsletter/volume-27/number-4/heart-of-europe-bio-crystallography HEC-23 2021 online conference C. Steegborn, Univ. Bayreuth 122 H. Nar Webpage HEC-24 2022 Dolní Vltavice, Czech Republic I. K. Smatanová, Univ. South Bohemia 108 K. Diederichs Webpage HEC-25 2023 Salem, Malchin, Germany M. Lammers, Univ. Greifswald 113 F. Wittinghofer Webpage HEC-26 2024 Kraków, Poland S. Glatt & P.Grudnik, Jagiellonian University 118 A. Pearson Webpage HEC-27 2025 Halberstadt, Germany M. Wahl, Free University of Berlin 112 T. Beck Webpage
References
External links Website of HEC-16 at the Attersee, Austria Website of HEC-17 in Berlin-Schmöckwitz, Germany Website of HEC-18 in Kutná Hora, Czech Republic