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US HUPO 2026

Name: US HUPO 2026
Start: 2026-02-21T08:00:00+10:00
End: 2026-02-25T17:00:00+10:00
Location: Hyatt Regency St. Louis at The Arch

February 21 @ 8:00 am – February 25 @ 5:00 pm

ABOUT THIS EVENT

IonOpticks is returning to US HUPO 2026 in St. Louis and we’re really looking forward to catching up with the proteomics community, meeting new researchers, and talking all things chromatography.

If you’re attending, you’ll find us at Booth 7 in the exhibition hall, where our team will be ready to chat about workflows, applications, and how researchers are getting the most out of their LC-MS setups. We’ll have products on display so you can get hands-on, along with fresh printed materials highlighting recent research and performance insights. And of course, we’ll have some of our signature IonOpticks merch available for visitors who stop by and say hello.

One of the big things we’re excited to share this year is NanoShield, our latest product designed to help improve column durability while maintaining the high-performance separations researchers rely on. As workflows continue to push for higher throughput and more consistent results, NanoShield was developed to help protect column performance under demanding conditions, support longer column lifetimes, and help labs keep instruments running smoothly without compromising data quality.

Our scientific presence

Poster presentation and lightning talk

Dr. TJ Blackburn will present a scientific poster and lightning talk at the conference, both focused on NanoShield. His presentations will walk through the science behind the technology, how it performs in real workflows, and what it can mean for researchers looking to improve robustness and consistency in their experiments.

ABSTRACT

Comparative Evaluation of Chromatographic Traps for Enhanced UHPLC Performance

The increase in speed and sensitivity of mass spectrometers has allowed faster sample analysis times and increased sample cohort size. In direct injection UHPLC workflows, samples are typically loaded at nano-flow rates, consuming valuable instrument time and limiting throughput. Integration of trap columns into UHPLC workflows can provide an effective solution to reducing sample loading overhead times by enabling rapid, high-pressure sample loading at increased flow rates. We have developed a range of UHPLC workflows which incorporate a novel trap column that reduce sample loading times and increase the percentage of a UHPLC method that is dedicated to sample analysis. These workflows also extend analytical column lifetime, reduce maintenance, and support scalable, high-throughput proteomic analyses that match the capabilities of next-generation mass spectrometry.

Traps were assessed in a trap-and-elute configuration coupled to an IonOpticks Aurora analytical columns, utilizing up to 200 SPD methods. Trap performance was compared to direct injection workflows to evaluate chromatographic and quantitative characteristics under high-throughput conditions. HeLa digests were used as the sample matrix and loaded under controlled flow and solvent conditions. Data were acquired across nano-flow UHPLC systems coupled to high-resolution mass spectrometers from Bruker and Thermo. Under accelerated loading conditions, traps maintained strong chromatographic performance with less than a 5% reduction in peptide identifications and reduced peak widths compared to direct injection. Retention-time stability and identifications remained consistent across replicates, supporting reliable, sustained high-throughput operation. Trap technology is a key enabler of the next generation of proteomic workflows, bridging the gap between analytical speed and data quality. By dramatically reducing sample loading times without compromising depth of coverage, these developments push the boundaries of high-throughput proteomics, accelerating large-scale studies and paving the way for more comprehensive and time-efficient biological discovery.