European Lipoprotein Club's Mission

The European Lipoprotein Club (ELC) was established in 1977 in order "to promote active participation, collaboration and exchange of ideas concerning basic and clinical research on the structure, function and metabolism of lipoproteins in health and disease".

The Club currently includes over 500 scientists from 15 Countries, and the number grows every year. The Club is thus a Europe-wide network of basic scientists and clinicians, with world-wide collaborations with colleagues actively involved in lipoprotein research. The network is strengthened and expanded by contacts established at the Club meetings, and fostered by the exchange of ideas, clinical material, techniques and young visiting investigators.

The Club organizes one scientific meeting every year (usually in September), based on the format of the Gordon Conferences, with particular emphasis on an active participation and in-depth discussion in an informal atmosphere. The meetings have been held since 1980 at the Evangelische Akademie in Tutzing (Germany).  The meetings are arranged by an organizing committee, currently of 14 members, representing as many different European Countries as possible. These representatives are elected by the members and serve for 5 years. One representative acts as the secretary of the Club and has the major responsibility for the meeting organization. 

Currently the secretary is Dr. Hans Dieplinger from Innsbruck, Austria. Dr. Philippa Talmud from London (England) acts as treasurer.Three topics, selected by the organizing Committee, are discussed at each meeting, in 5 working sessions spread over 4 days, starting from a State of the Art Lecture from an invited speaker. Anyone interested and involved in researches in the lipoprotein field is invited to submit an abstract for the meeting. Participating individuals are selected on the relevance and scientific merit of their abstracts, and a consistent number of those attending the meeting are chosen to present their work. Because of the size of the lecture hall, and in order to maintain an atmosphere conducive to active discussion, participants are limited to 90. A meeting report is published every year in Atherosclerosis.

For many years, the ELC has been generously supported by Boehringer Mannheim, to the extent that all housing, dining and other conference facilities are being taken care off. At the 1998 meeting, after the take-over of Boehringer-Mannheim by F.Hoffmann-LaRoche, representatives from Roche made clear promises to further support the ELC. Travel costs for invited spreakers are being raised on an ad hoc basis.