The Pittcon 2012 Organizing Committee recently announced that this year’s conference and exposition for laboratory science attracted 15,754 attendees to its conferees and exhibition, which took place March 11-15 in Orlando, FL. Twenty-nine percent of the conferees were from 89 countries outside the U.S.

“In a time where economic changes, increased mergers and acquisitions, and rising travel costs have a substantial impact on conferences, attendees still consider Pittcon to be a most valuable educational and networking resource for the global scientific community,” said Jon Peace, Pittcon 2012 president.

The exposition included 948 exhibiting companies occupying 1,854 booths to showcase their latest laboratory instrumentation, equipment and services across a range of applications and technologies used in laboratory science. There were 191 exhibiting companies (20%) from 28 countries outside of the U.S. This year, Pittcon had 119 (12.5%) first-time exhibitors.

The Technical Program included more than 2,000 individual presentations distributed among invited symposia, organized contributed sessions, achievement awards, workshops, and poster presentations. More than 100 invited speakers addressed topics including alternative and sustainable energy, homeland security, food and drug safety, environmental issues, new materials development, and bioanalytical techniques. Approximately 1,400 people attended the Plenary Lecture presented by R. Graham Cooks, and Steven Benner delivered the Capstone Lecture to an audience of 700.

The 2012 Short Course program offered 95 courses (16 of which were new) and drew approximately 1,400 registrants, which was a 16% increase over 2011 attendance.

For more information, visit www.pittcon.org.