Best of the Week: HPLC 2025 Previews, Interviewing 2025 ASMS Award Winners, Biopharmaceuticals and Artificial Intelligence
This week, LCGC International published a variety of articles on trending topics in separation science, including previews of HPLC 2025 and an interview with one of this year’s ASMS award winners. Below, we’ve highlighted some of the most popular articles that were published this week.
We’d love to hear from you! Is there a topic you’d like to see covered in LCGC? Share your ideas with us—we value your feedback and are committed to exploring the subjects that matter most to our readers. Email chroncich@mjhlifesciences.com with your thoughts. Happy reading!
HPLC 2025 Preview: Fundamentally Speaking (Part 1)
Michael Lämmerhofer
Recently, Michael Lämmerhofer from the Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Tübingen, Germany, spoke to JFK Huber Lecture Award winner of 2024 Torgny Fornstedt, professor in analytical chemistry and leader of the Fundamental Separation Science Group, Karlstad University, Sweden, about his work in high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) with a focus on fundamentals and industrial applications. The first part of their conversations can be found here.
Biopharmaceutical Characterization in the Age of Artificial Intelligence
Jared Auclair, Anurag S. Rathore
The complexity of biopharmaceutical products (such as monoclonal antibodies and recombinant proteins) requires the use of multiple high-resolution and complementary analytical tools to ensure quality, safety, and efficacy. With the recent widespread adoption of artificial intelligence (AI), which thrives on large data sets, the field of biopharmaceutical analysis is on the brink of a transformative shift. This column explores the evolving role of AI in biopharmaceutical characterization, highlighting breakthroughs in machine learning for complex data analysis, the automation of method development, and AI-driven decision-making in process control.
Aaron Acevedo
Every year at the American Society for Mass Spectrometry (ASMS) conference, awards are presented to honor veteran and newcomer researchers making notable contributions in the field of mass spectrometry (MS). One such award is the Research at PUI Award. Given out annually and fully funded by Agilent Technologies, the award promotes academic research in MS by faculty members and their students at primarily undergraduate institutions (PUIs). This year's award went to Emma Guiberson of Middlebury College. Recently, we sat down with Guiberson to learn about her career and how she got to where she is now. Here, we discuss her current research efforts, what and who guided her to where she is today, and what advice she has for the next generation of mass spectrometrists.
Discovering the Hidden Plastic in Garden Compost with Pyr-GC–MS
John Chasse
Compost and potting mixes are emerging sources of both conventional and biodegradable plastic residues in soil. Although biodegradable plastics are designed to degrade, they require specific conditions that are not always met in typical composting environments. An Australian study used pyrolysis coupled to gas chromatography mass spectrometry (Pyr-GC–MS) to analyze the presence of plastic polymers in commercial and homemade composts. LCGC International spoke to Simran Kaur—a PhD candidate at the Queensland Alliance for Environmental Health Sciences (QAEHS) at The University of Queensland in Woolloongabba, Australia—to find out more about her team’s findings.
In Bruges: The HPLC 2025 Conference
Gert Desmet, Deirdre Cabooter, Frédéric Lynen, Sebastiaan Eeltink, Ken Broeckhoven
The HPLC symposium series is known as the world’s leading conference on liquid phase separations and hyphenation with advanced detection technologies, including mass spectrometry (MS) and data treatment. European editions typically draw a crowd of more than 1200 (peaking at close to 1500 for some editions). Featured within this article is more information about this year’s upcoming HPLC symposium, which will take place Sunday through Thursday, 15–19 June, 2025, in Bruges, Belgium.
Emerging Trends and Challenges in Detecting Residues and Contaminants in Food in the Exposome Era
June 18th 2025This article describes the analytical challenges of chemical exposomics in food safety. The need for high-throughput, multi-platform approaches—such as LC–HRMS and GC–HRMS with IMS—to capture the full spectrum of potential contaminants in our food supply is emphasised.
New Research Explores Role of Nucleotide Hydrophobicity in Oligonucleotide Separation
June 18th 2025Researchers from Waters and Biospring studied the contribution of nucleotide type and modifications on the retention and resolution of 22–24 nt long oligonucleotides in different chromatographic methods.
A Life Measured in Peaks: Honoring Alan George Marshall (1944–2025)
June 18th 2025A pioneer of FT-ICR Mass Spectrometry, Alan G. Marshall (1944–2025), is best known for co-inventing Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry (FT-ICR MS), a transformative technique that enabled ultrahigh-resolution analysis of complex mixtures. Over a career spanning more than five decades at institutions like the University of British Columbia, The Ohio State University, and Florida State University, he published over 650 peer-reviewed papers and mentored more than 150 scientists. Marshall’s work profoundly impacted fields ranging from astrobiology to petroleomics and earned him numerous prestigious awards and fellowships. Revered for his intellect, mentorship, and dedication to science, he leaves behind a legacy that continues to shape modern mass spectrometry.
