Search Events

The NASA Snow Working Group for Remote Sensing (SWGR) has been holding a series of meetings to create a blueprint for future U.S. and International snow remote sensing research, and to create a community and forum for the exchange of ideas related to snow and remote sensing. In August we held a three-day workshop in Boulder that was widely attended. We are continuing the work.

Between January 14-16th 2014 we will hold our 2nd Snow Remote Sensing Workshop at Granby, Colorado. The workshop has three goals:

• To continue community work on the blueprint for snow remote sensing that was begun at the 1st workshop in August.
• To exchange ideas and new results related to snow remote sensing, and
• To demonstrate new instruments and techniques for measuring snow in the field.

At the 1st workshop, it was decided that SWGR should work toward developing a community snow school for graduate students and practitioners. We are pleased to announce that we will be able the first such course on January 7-9th at Fraser Experimental Forest in Colorado. The winter course is aimed at teaching snow measurement skills to new practitioners and modelers in order to increase the quality of the results for all snow data users. The course will introduce students to standard and specialized methods of characterizing the snowpack. The winter course will be followed in the summer by a companion course computer for snow model, details of which will be forthcoming soon.

For energy companies exploring the Alaskan Tundra, ice roads are often the only way to travel. But, building these roads is complex, often dangerous, and could have long term impacts on the environment. Under a grant from the U.S. Dept. of Energy, the NSDSS was developed by the UAF, Texas A&M University, and Atkins Engineering to help the various stakeholders of the ice road planning process to collaboratively design ice roads. Incorporating optimal route finding methods and climate change-aware lake water quantity and quality modeling, the NSDSS provides critical information in support of the annual ice road planning process.

Pre-registration for webinars is strongly encouraged. The audio portion of the call is through a toll-free phone line and the slide presentation is streamed via computer. For instructions on participating through your home office or at a satellite viewing location with others in your community, please see our webinar information page.

We would like to announce the 2014 annual Danish Greenland ice sheet seminar to be held this year at the Danish meteorological Institute.

The purpose of the meeting is to encourage collaboration between Danish based researchers working on the Greenland ice sheet with a programme of research talks in the morning and an informal session in the afternoon, this year focusing on science and field activities in north-east Greenland.

As in previous years, we invite each group to coordinate a 25 min presentation to highlight current work and activities of interest to the Greenland ice sheet network in Denmark. We also welcome new participants who are also currently working on science activities related to the Greenland ice sheet in Denmark who have not previously joined us.

For practical reasons please let us know before 30th December, if you plan to attend the meeting and what your talk title will be.

Details

Date: 9th January 2014
Time: 9 am – 4 pm
Location: The auditorium, DMI, Lyngbyvej 100, Copenhagen
Registration: Please register your attendance by email before 30th December.
Talks: Please confirm your talk title to us before the 30th December so we can make the agenda.
Note that participants are required to sign in at reception.

This webinar will introduce the third thematic area related to long-term observing management and governance -- the review process. Several aspects of review for long-term efforts will be discussed, including the frequency of review, observing-specific criteria, and best practices of the review process. The webinar will be available through Webex (details available at www.arctichub.net).

Background: On October 31, 2013, a kick-off webinar was held by the National Science Foundation to introduce 35 questions grouped in 8 thematic areas which address best practices for long-term observing management and governance. Over the next 20 weeks, 9 webinars will be held to further delve into each of the 8 themes: (1) Definition, (2) Life cycle and horizons, (3) Review: frequency, criteria, and process, (4) Network relevance, (5) Funding models, (6) Award structure and management, (7) Information sharing and communication, and (8) National and global connectivity. The ninth webinar will be a wrap-up discussion and assessment of current exchanges on these 8 themes. For a list of the 35 questions within these 8 thematic areas, please visit www.arctichub.net and click on the "Long Term Observing Management Discussion Group" link on the home page and then click Discussion on the left-hand side of the group page.

The webinars will introduce the themes and questions in detail, but the discussion continues beyond the webinar timeframe. Interested persons who would like to lead discussions on one or more of the 35 questions are encouraged to apply for discussion funding support through an online application at: http://www.arcus.org/search/aon/discussion-funding-form. Funding details and eligibility are on the form webpage. The discussion content provided through this activity will inform best practices and lessons learned in long-term observing from the viewpoint of the wide range of actors involved in natural and social observing, its management, support, and development.

The objective of this multidisciplinary conference is to think about the idea of “cold” in all of its multiple disciplinary variations—geographical, cultural, medical, biological, climatological, engineered, physical, linguistic and sociological. Defined by Étienne Lalou as “both a relative and subjective sensation,” cold is invisible. Its manifestations can only be appreciated in the effect it has on bodies and objects as well as through human adaptation (architecture, transportation, clothing, social and cultural practices), representation (literary, filmic, pictorial) and its technical or technological production (refrigeration and cooling, air conditioning, freezing, etc.)

Organizers welcome contributions that bring together more than one discipline and that address both general and specific issues associated with the idea of cold. For example:

• The effects of cold on human activities, bodies and matter
• The idea of cold as a variable, universal experience
• The axiological and spiritual dimensions of cold representations
• The biological effects of cold temperatures
• Cold prevention
• Cold architecture and architectural adaptation to cold temperatures
• The use of, adaptation to and constraints associated with cold in terms of transportation
• New medical, industrial and technological uses of cold temperatures
• The idea of cold as cultural object built by discourse
• The effects of cold on cultural and social practices
• The idea of cold in mythology, art and philosophy
• Experiencing cold in terms of metaphysics and identity
• Physical properties of cold temperature
• Biological adaptation to the cold in flora, fauna and humans
• History of technical and industrial cold and cooling production
• The idea of cold as a sign of invisibility
• The effects of cold on food consumption (refrigerated/frozen food)
• Representations of cold as a sign of climate change

The event is co-organized by the "Cultures, environments, Arctic, representations, climate" research centre of the Observatoire de Versailles Saint-Quentin and the Laboratory for the Comparative Multidisciplinary Study of Representations of the North at the Université du Québec à Montréal, as part of a France-Québec cooperation project. Selected papers will be published.

This conference is organized by Daniel Arsenault (Université du Québec à Montréal), Jan Borm (Université de Versailles—Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines), Daniel Chartier (Université du Québec à Montréal), Odile Parsis-Barubé (Université de Lille 3—Charles-de-Gaulle) and Alain Sarkissian (Université de Versailles—Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines).

Are you interested in incorporating field work into your research projects but you're worried that you don't know how to properly plan & execute a successful field campaign? Have you participated in numerous field campaigns with varied success and would like to improve your field planning, leading, and execution skills?

If so, please join us at the Getting Out in the Field as a Skill Workshop held at the upcoming AGU Fall meeting (http://fallmeeting.agu.org/2013/events/getting-out-in-the-field-as-a-sk…). The workshop will be held on Wednesday, December 11th from 3-5pm in the Marriott Marquis Golden Gate A. The workshop will provide a panel discussion on the challenges, benefits, and strategies for being successful at planning, leading, and completing fieldwork in a variety of settings. All career stages are welcome to attend!

The workshop's panelists include Dr. Bob Hawley (Dartmouth College), Dr. Fiamma Straneo (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution), Dr. Julie Brigham-Grette (U. Massachusetts-Amherst), and Allen O'Bannon (Field Risk Manager, CH2MHILL Polar Services). Each panelist will briefly provide his/her key tips for the successful planning and execution of field work, then the panel will open-up to questions from the audience.

The workshop is co-hosted by the Earth Science Women's Network (http://eswnonline.org/) and Association of Polar Early Career Scientists (http://www.apecs.is/). If you have any questions about the workshop, please email Ellyn Enderlin (ellyn.enderlin [at] gmail.com).

The BSG runs a workshop for new research students in December each year and we encourage you to attend. The workshop has been running at the fantastic Cumberland Lodge in Windsor Great Park for over 30 years – many notable researchers and academics have been and benefited from this course!

The content is non-technical, but provides training in project management, group work, dealing with large data sets, fieldwork, lab and numerical modelling. But one of the the most important aspects is meeting other new researchers, finding out how the PhD is working for others in different Universities and often making friends and contacts that can last a career. You’ll also meet a wide variety of academics and facilitators who are practicing researchers as well as the BSG postgrad representatives on the Executive. The BSG chair normally gives an entertaining evening talk.

More information can be found on the workshop website.

Welcome to the American Geophysical Union’s 46th annual Fall Meeting! Join more than 24,000 Earth and space scientists, educators, students, and other leaders in San Francisco, California, 9-13 December, as they gather to present groundbreaking research and connect with colleagues. For 46 years, scientists from around the world gather at the AGU Fall Meeting to exchange information and broaden their knowledge base. In addition to the scientific programming, the meeting offers over 50 Town Halls and Workshops, including one on Monday, Dec. 9, titled, "Interagency Arctic Research Policy Committee (IARPC) and Study of Environmental Arctic Change (SEARCH), organized by Helen Wiggins, Brendan Kelly, and Hajo Eicken, from 12:30 pm to 1:30 pm in 2018 Moscone West.

Please visit the AGU website for more information about the 2013 Fall Meeting.

ArcticNet's 9th Annual Scientific Meeting (ASM2013) will be held from 9 to 13 December 2013 at The World Trade and Convention Centre in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

As the largest annual Arctic research gathering held in Canada, ArcticNet's ASM is the ideal venue to showcase results from all fields of Arctic research and stimulate networking and partnership activities. Over 500 participants are expected again this year.

Building on the success of previous ASMs, the ASM2013 welcomes the participation of researchers, students, policy and decision makers, representatives of government and non-government organizations, the private sector, northern stakeholders and media to address the global challenges and opportunities arising from climate change and modernization in the Arctic.

The ASM2013 will also be hosting the second annual Arctic Inspiration Prize Ceremony, where one to five Prizes and associated awards totalling $1 million will be presented.

The Alaska Arctic Policy Commission will convene to continue working on their draft of Alaska's Arctic Policy. This Preliminary Report will be submitted to the State Legislature on January 30, 2014 and will help guide the Commission's work in 2014 as they prepare to submit a final Report in January 2015. At the Anchorage meeting Commissioners will review and discuss draft Arctic policy statements, specific preliminary recommendations, and the supporting background document. See www.akarctic.com for a draft agenda and additional information as it becomes available.

Public testimony will be accepted Monday, Dec 9 from 11:15a-12:30p, limited to 3min. Supplementary written testimony can be emailed to aapcgovernance [at] gmail.com. The meeting will be audio streamed live on akl.tv.