The 11th Conference of the Balkan Physical Union (BPU11 Congress) was held in Belgrade, Serbia, from 28th August to 1st September 2022. Most of the sessions were held in the beautiful building of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts – SASA, in downtown Belgrade.

BPU11 was organised by the Balkan Physical Union, local co-organisers from Serbia and the European Physical Society. The members of BPU are the National Physical Societies of Albania, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Greece, Montenegro, Moldova, North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia and Turkey.

BPU11 was organised in the tradition of prior conferences, with an international participation addressing all fields of physics.

During the meeting, there were many high level international talks. Luc Bergé, the EPS President, gave a plenary talk on THz waves generated by laser-plasma interactions. David Lee, the EPS Secretary General participated as a speaker in the Round Table on Careers in Physics organised by representatives of the EPS Young Minds Programme. Beside the 12 plenary and 20 invited lecturers, more than 100 oral talks and about 200 posters were presented, and 5 Round tables were held. The BPU11 Congress was followed by 4 satellite events, 2 workshops and 2 Schools.

BPU11 was a hybrid event that attracted almost 450 participants from around the world, with around 300 onsite and about 150 online participants. This conference is a valuable addition to the panoply of physics conferences in Europe as it highlights the excellent research in Balkan states. It is a practical measure to address the issue of how to increase participation of countries that are under-represented in EC funded research.

Attendees at the Opening Ceremony of BPU11 - image: David Lee