The recent, pan-European, informal conference on laser bioimaging, co-sponsored by Coherent and the Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, was hailed as a successful and stimulating meeting by many of the nearly 100 attendees and invited speakers.  Held  October 14 – 15, 2015, in Genoa, Italy, and chaired by Professor Alberto Diaspro, the conference was built around invited talks from over a dozen leading Italian and European researchers, covering super-resolution microscopy, multiphoton imaging, and  advanced techniques, such as CARS & SRS microscopy and  non-linear neurophysiology.  Coherent supported this conference by providing travel and hospitality expenses for the invited speakers, as well as lunches and a conference dinner where participants could interact informally and also dialog with Coherent management and technical personnel who attended the conference.  The company also presented awards for the three best posters as chosen by a poll of attendees.Darryl McCoy, Director of Product Management and one of the key Coherent organizers and hosts explains, “We have previously sponsored this type of conference in Oxford, England.  Based on the success and positive feedback of this Genoa meeting, we now plan to hold this as an annual meeting that will rotate through the major European countries; laser imaging applications in the host country will usually feature in about half of the invited talks.  From Coherent’s viewpoint, this gives us an opportunity to promote and publicize what we consider to be an important field of study, as well as to better understand the exact needs of researchers.” 

The first day of the meeting was held at the beautiful Old Stock Exchange (“Sala delle Grida” – Palazzo della Borsa) in central Genoa, and the second day was held at the co-sponsor the Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia.  The catered conference dinner was held in one of Genoa’s famous renaissance palaces against a backdrop of trompe l’oeil frescos – rather appropriate for a conference featuring mainly three-dimensional imaging.