Preliminary Scientific Programme

The program is subject to changes and will be updated as per the scientific program requirements.


Day 1 | Wednesday, September 24th, 2025
08:00 - 08:45 Registration
08:45 - 09:00 Welcome Address - Opening Remarks
Evi Lianidou, Professor of Analytical Chemistry – Clinical Chemistry, Analysis of Circulating Tumor Cells Lab, Dept of Chemistry, University of Athens, Greece
09:00-10:40 Plenary Lectures Session 1 | CTC and biology of metastasis - latest advances
09:00 - 09:25 PL1-1 | Mechanisms of Cancer Dormancy and Reactivation
Julio Agguire-Ghiso, PhD, Director, Institute for Cancer Dormancy and Tumor Microenvironment, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York, USA
09:25 - 09:50 PL1-2 | Cell Plasticity in Breast Cancer
Andreas Trumpp, PhD, Head, Division of Stem Cells and Cancer at the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Heidelberg, Germany
09:50 - 10:15 PL1-3 | Epithelial plasticity dynamics from primary tumor to metastatic outgrowth
Maria Angela Nieto Toledano, Instituto de Neurociencias (CSIC-UMH), Alicante, Spain
10:15 - 10:40 PL1-4 | Circulating tumor cell clusters
Nicola Aceto, PhD, Institute of Molecular Health Sciences, ETH, Zurich, Switzerland
10:40 – 11:30 Coffee Break – Poster Viewing and networking
11:30-12:45 Plenary Lectures Session 2 | Εarly detection and minimal residual disease
11:30 - 11:55 PL2-1 | Detecting cancer with liquid biopsy
Nicholas Papadopoulos, PhD, Professor of Oncology and Pathology, Director of Translational Genetics, Ludwig Center for Cancer Genetics and Therapeutics, Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, USA
11:55 - 12:20 PL2-2 | TBA
Dave Hoon, PhD, Director, Translational Molecular Medicine, SJCI PHS, Santa Monica, California, USA
12:20 - 12:45 PL2-3 | TBA
Minetta Liu, M.D., Chief Medical Officer, Oncology, Natera, USA
12:45 - 14:00 Lunch break
14:00 - 15:00 Session 1: Basic research in liquid biopsies (SELECTED ORAL PRESENTATIONS)
15:00 - 16:00 Industry-sponsored Oral Presentations I
16:00 - 17:00 Coffee Break - Poster Session 1: Basic research in liquid biopsies
17:00 – 18:15 Plenary lectures Session 3 | Liquid biopsy and precision medicine in breast cancer
17:00 - 17:25 PL3-1 | The CTCs research and clinical application: A forgotten component of liquid biopsy?
Massimo Cristofanilli, MD, FACP, Chief, Breast Medical Oncology, Associate Director of Precision Medicine, Sandra and Edward Meyer Cancer Center at Weill Cornell Medicine, Scientific Director, the Englander Institute of Precision Medicine, Co-Leader, Meyer Cancer Center Management Team, Weill Cornell Medicine/New York-Presbyterian Hospital, Department of Medicine, Division of Hematology-Oncology, New York, USA
17:25 - 17:50 PL3-2 | Clinical applications of liquid biopsy in breast cancer
Jean-Yves Pierga, MD, PhD, Professor of Medical Oncology, at the Institute Curie and University Paris Descartes, Paris, France
17:50 – 18:15 PL3-3 | ctDNA for precision medicine in early breast cancer
Michail Ignatiadis, MD, PhD, Director, Breast Medical Oncology Clinic & Program, Medical Oncology Department, Institut Bordet, Associate Professor, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Chair, Breast Cancer Group, EORTC, Belgium
18:30 – 21:00 Welcome reception

Day 2 | Thursday, September 25th, 2025

08:30-09:00 Extra session: Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions – Staff Exchanges program
Sotirios Kiokias, MBA, PhD, Research Programme Manager, Chemistry Panel leader, European Research Executive Agency, Brussels, Belgium
09:00 - 10:40 Plenary lectures Session 4 | Recent advances in CTC analysis
09:00 - 09:25 PL4-1 | Beyond Seeing: AI and the Digital Pathology Revolution
Richard J. Cote, M.D., FRCPath, FCAP, Professor and Incoming Chair, Department of Pathology and Immunology, Pathologist-in-Chief, Barnes-Jewish Hospital, Washington University in St Louis, St Louis, USA
09:25 - 09:50 PL4-2 | From Milliliters to Liters: Transforming EpCAM+ CTC detection through High-Volume Analysis
Nikolas Stoecklein, MD, Professor, Experimental Surgical Oncology, Heinrich Heine University, Düsseldorf, Germany
09:50 - 10:15 PL4-3 | Multi-site sampling in Pancreatic Cancer
Peter Kuhn, PhD, University Professor and Director of CSI-Cancer, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA
10:15 - 10:40 PL4-4 | Early detection of recurrence in head and neck cancer patients using ctDNA and CTCs
Chamindie Punyadeera, PhD, FTSE, GCLead, GAICD, Griffith University, Institute for Biomedicine and Glycomics (IBG), Saliva and Liquid Biopsy Translational Laboratory, Queensland, Australia
10:40 - 11:30 Coffee Break – Poster Viewing and networking
11:30 - 12:45 Plenary lectures Session 5 | New dimensions in liquid biopsy: DNA methylation markers and extracellular vesicles
11:30 - 11:55 PL5-1 | New PCR and bisulfide-free sequencing methods for epigenetic 5mC and 5hmC
Thomas Carell, MD, Professor, Center for Nucleic Acid Therapies at the Department of Chemistry, Institute for Chemical Epigenetics, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, München, Germany
11:55 - 12:20 PL5-2 | Tissue-naïve MRD detection and therapy monitoring using plasma cell-free DNA Methylomes
Daniel De Carvalho, Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, University Health Network, Toronto, Canada
12:20 - 12:45 PL5-3 | Extracellular vesicles: from technology to biomarker application
An Hendrix, MD, Professor, Cancer Research Institute Ghent, Belgium
12:45 - 14:00 Lunch break
14:00 - 15:00 Session 2: Novel Technologies in Liquid Biopsies (SELECTED ORAL PRESENTATIONS)
15:00 - 16:00 Industry-sponsored Oral Presentations II
16:00 - 17:00 Coffee Break - Poster Session 2: Novel Technologies in liquid biopsies
17:00 - 18:15 Plenary lectures Session 6 | Novel insights on ctDNA analysis
17:00 - 17:25 PL6-1 | Unlocking the Power of Urine cfDNA
Ellen Heitzer, PhD, Institute of Human Genetics, Diagnostic and Research Center for Molecular BioMedicine, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria
17:25 - 17:50 PL6-2 | Novel developments for detecting mutation and methylation-based DNA cancer biomarkers using circulating DNA
Mike Makrigiorgos, PhD, Professor and Director, Medical Physics and Biophysics, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA
17:50 – 18:15 PL6-3 | Smaller, Cheaper, Faster: Where Next for Liquid Biopsies
Nitzan Rosenfeld, PhD, Director, Barts Cancer Institute - Α Cancer Research UK Centre of Excellence, Queen Mary University of London, London, UK

Day 3 | Friday, September 26th, 2025
08:30 - 09:00 Extra session European Research Council, Executive Agency
Evgenia Paloumpi, PhD, Scientific Officer, European Research Council, Executive Agency
09:00 - 10:40 Plenary lectures Session 7: Liquid biopsy in the clinic: Lung cancer
09:00 - 09:25 PL7-1 | MRD in Lung Cancer
Christian Rolfo, MD, PhD, MBA, Dr.hc., Professor and Associate. Director for Clinical Research, Center for Thoracic Oncology, The Tisch Cancer Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Mount Sinai Health System, One Gustave Levy Place, Box 1079, New York, USA
09:25 - 09:50 PL7-2 | CTCs: From the Laboratory to the Clinic
Rafael López, MD, PhD, Medical Oncology Dept. & Translational Medical Oncology Group, University Clinical Hospital & Health Research Institute (IDIS); CIBERONC, Santiago de Compostela University School of Medicine, Santiago de Compostela, Spain
09:50 - 10:15 PL7-3 | Liquid biopsy approaches for lung cancer characterization, residual disease detection, and therapy response monitoring
Valsamo Anagnostou, MD-PhD, Associate Professor, Medical Oncology, Leader, Precision Oncology Analytics, Director, Thoracic Oncology Biorepository, Co-director, Thoracic Oncology Precision Medicine Center of Excellence, Upper Aerodigestive Oncology Program, Co-leader, Molecular Tumor Board, Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
10:15 - 10:40 PL7-4 | Small Cell Lung Cancer liquid biopsies, molecular subtypes and tumour plasticity
Caroline Dive, PhD, Director, Cancer Research UK National Biomarker Centre, The University of Manchester, UK
10:40 - 11:30 Coffee Break – Poster Viewing and networking
11:30 - 12:45 Plenary lectures Session 8 | Liquid biopsy in the clinic: Colorectal cancer
11:30 - 11:55 PL8-1 | Genotyping colorectal cancer in the blood for therapeutic purposes
Alberto Bardelli Professor, Department of Oncology, University of Torino, and IFOM ETS - The AIRC Institute of Molecular Oncology, Milano, Italy
11:55 - 12:20 PL8-2 | Circulating tumor DNA as a tool to understand, monitor, and overcome therapeutic resistance
Ryan Corcoran, MD, PhD, Assoc. Professor, Department of Medicine, Division of Hematology & Oncology, Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center & Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA

12:20 - 12:45 PL8-3 | TBA
Pashtoon Murtaza Kasi, M.D., M.S., Medical Director of GI Medical Oncology; Associate Clinical Professor, Department of Medical Oncology & Therapeutics Research, City of Hope, Orange County, California, USA
12:45 - 14:00 Lunch break
14:00 - 15:00 Session 3: CTCs clinical applications (SELECTED ORAL PRESENTATIONS)
15:00 - 16:00 Industry-sponsored Oral Presentations III
16:00 - 17:00 Coffee Break - Poster session 3: CTCs and ctDNA clinical applications
17:00 - 18:30 Plenary lectures Session 9 | Liquid biopsy in the clinic: Prostate cancer
17:00 - 17:25 PL9-1 | Liquid biopsies informing on therapy in prostate cancer
Johann de Bono, Professor, Head of the Division of Clinical Studies, The Institute for Cancer Research (ICR) and Royal Marsden, London, UK
17:25 - 17:50 PL9-2 | Clinical utility of plasma exosome proteomics in advanced prostate cancer
Emmanuel Antonarakis, MD, Associate Director for Translational Research and Director of Genitourinary Oncology in HOT Division, University of Minnesota–Masonic Cancer Center, USA
18:00 – 18:30 Michael Speicher: Memorial Lecture and AWARD
18:00 - 18:30 Michael Speicher award for best oral presentation
Helen Heitzer, PhD, Institute of Human Genetics, Diagnostic and Research Center for Molecular BioMedicine, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria
20.00 CONGRESS dinner

Day 4 | Saturday, September 27th, 2025
08:30 - 09:00 Extra session: Molecular Oncology Special Issue on the ACTC 2025 meeting
Ruzhica Bogeska, PhD, Managing Editor, Molecular Oncology (wholly owned by the Federation of European Biochemical Societies (FEBS)
09:00 - 11:30 Session 10: Liquid Biopsy: Future Directions
09:00 - 09:30 Multimodal liquid biopsy analysis, standardization of Liquid Biopsy assays, and External Quality Control
Evi Lianidou, PhD, Professor of Analytical Chemistry – Clinical Chemistry, Analysis of Circulating Tumor Cells Lab, Dept of Chemistry, University of Athens, Greece
09:30 - 10.30 PANEL DISCUSSION
  • Consensus on the clinical utility of CTCs in solid tumors
  • Consensus o the clinical utility of ctDNA
10.30 - 11.30 Introduction
  • TBA Presentation #1
  • TBA Presentation #2
  • TBA Presentation #3

Panel Discussion
Closing Remarks
Lauren Leiman, Executive Director of the Blood Profiling Atlas in Cancer (BloodPAC), USA

11:30 - 12:00 TRAVEL AND BEST POSTER AWARDS
12:00 - 12.30 CLOSING REMARKS- END OF THE MEETING