We have just received the provisional list of oral presentations for the upcoming IULTCS congress in Florence. We must stress that this is a provisional list only and may be subject to change. The papers are listed alphabetically by country.

Australia: Salinity reduction in tannery effluent, by Catherine Money, Chandra Nabu.

China: A new pretannage with Glyoxal, by Xiang Zhou, Wang Hongru; Exploring on the oxidation approach of chromium III into chromium VI by unsaturated lipoids in leather, by Sun Genxing, Yu Congzheng, Lu Pengjie, Qian Youping, Ren Huiiin; Influence of sweat on hide and leather, by Keytong Tang, Jinglong Liu, Fang Wang.

France: From crust leather to semi-finished leather by using dense pressurized CO2, by A L Hans; Defects automatic detection on wet-blue, stain and finished leather, by C Vigier.

Germany: Formaldehyde-free leather – a realistic objective? By H P Germann, Renate Meyndt; Dimensional stability of leather under changing climate conditions, by A Trommer, M Meyer; Thermoplastic collagen – a new application for untanned byproducts, by Michael Meyer, Kotlarski Oliver.

India: Studies on an eco-friendly process of chrome tannage, by Goutam Mukherjee, Chakraborty, Biswas, Chandrababu, Karthikeyan, Ramasami; Reserved leather processing for cleaner production, by Saravanabhavan, Raghava Rao, Thanikaivelan, Nair, Ramasami.

Italy: La caratterizzazione dei composti organici volatili nel cuoio, by Tomaselli, B Naviglio, D Naviglio, Comite, Calvanese; The influence of leather in the pianoforte evolution in the XVIII and XIX centuries, by De Feo; La produzione di articoli metal-free per arredamento auto, by Sammarco; Impianto Aquarno: la transformazione in processo ‘tutto biologico’, by Andreanini, Brogi, Fiaschi; Valorization of skin fleshing by reutilization within the tanning industrial cycle, by Castiello, Degl’Innocenti, D’Elia, Salvadori, Seggiani, Vitolo; Mathematical modeling of the chrome and chrome-zeolite tanning process, by Ciambelli, B Navigli, Sannino, Manna, Vaiano, Calvanese; Misurazione e diagnosi degli odori nel processo conciario, by Scaglia.

Mexico: Implementacion de una fragrancia a un producto de piel de bovino empleado para el interior de automoviles, by Pedro Cruz, M Maldonado, H Escolana, M A Sanchez.

New Zealand: Chrome free organic tannages and molecular level understanding of the tanning process for the production of leather with high hydrothermal stability by Das Gupta, P Bishop, S Deb Choudhury; Ealastin in lamb pelts – its role in leather quality, by Edmonds, Das Gupta, Allsop, Cooper, Passman, Deb Choudhury, Norris.

Romania: BAT theory and practical reality in Romanian tanneries, by Albu Luminita, V Mirciu, V Bratulescu.

Spain: Oxidative unhairing with hair recovery, by J M Morera, Bartoli, Borras, Vila; Energy balance of the beamhouse in Europe, by Luisa Cabeza.

Switzerland: The iceman and his leather clothes, by Alois Puentener, S Moss, AG Novartis; Determination of fogging characteristics for automotive leathers – the new EN 14288 test method, by Campbell Page, J Noger, Dichaut-Gudemann.

Turkey: A new approach to the degreasing process, by Volkan Candar, Yonca, Eryasa.

UK: Development of a high stability chromium free tannage, by Victoria Addy, Santiago Clara, Andrew Hudson; Innovative options for solid waste management, by Victoria Addy, Andrew Hudson, Kerry Senior, A Catalina, S Lanlois,K Kolamaznik; Evaluation, enumeration and control of bacteria in rawstock by Amanda Long, Robert Hallam; Development of an optimized test method for the detection of banned amines in leather, by Amanda Long, J W Wegener, L Mattiason.

USA: An update on crosslinking of leather finishes, by Jerry Levy.