Registration for the (virtual) 25th CHEP conference, which will take place from 17 to 21 May 2021, is now open. In the light of the ongoing pandemic, it was decided to organise an online version of the free-to-join conference this year as a showcase for software and computing in high-energy physics (HEP) and to support the community, encourage discussion and foster further innovation in the field. Instructions for joining conference sessions will be sent to registered participants only.

The scientific programme for vCHEP2021 addresses the computing, networking, storage and software needs of the world’s leading high-energy and nuclear physics experiments, which analyse hundreds of petabytes of data using worldwide computing resources. vCHEP2021 will place a strong emphasis on innovation, and the topics covered will span the Large Hadron Collider experiments upgrades, machine learning, quantum computing, distributed computing systems, and algorithm optimisation and parallelisation.

For the first time at CHEP, contributors have been asked to prepare an abstract and an extended submission of six to ten pages, describing their work in detail. More than 200 papers from all over the world have been submitted, which will certainly make for a rich and vibrant conference.

The programme has been designed with a strong high-energy and nuclear physics focus. The most innovative contributions have been placed centre stage: they will be the subject of a series of longer talks in plenary sessions. The many other relevant papers will be presented in a series of parallel sessions throughout the week. The programme has been arranged to allow for global participation from the Asia-Pacific region, Europe and the Americas.

All contributions accepted at the conference will be published in the form of proceedings. The best contributions will be submitted to Computing and Software for Big Science (CSBS, Springer), one of the premier peer-reviewed journals for the field.

And while you prepare for this year’s conference, you might already want to save the date for next year’s: CHEP2022, organised by Jefferson Lab, which will take place in Norfolk, Virginia, USA, from 16 to 20 May 2022.

For any questions related to vCHEP2021, contact: chep2021-secretariat@cern.ch.