Planning continues for the State of the Arctic Conference, which will be held 16–19 March 2010 at the Hyatt Regency Miami in Miami, Florida. The main goal of the conference is to review our understanding of the arctic system in a time of rapid environmental change. It will provide an open international forum for discussion of future research directions aimed toward a better understanding of the arctic system and its trajectory. Topics will range from basic understanding of the Arctic and system-wide change to developing response strategies to adapt and mitigate change.
Community input is being integrated into the conference program, which will be available soon on the conference website. Major science themes include:
Advances in arctic system understanding—the basic functioning of the arctic system, including all of its human dimensions;
Arctic change—rapid, system-scale changes and the capability to project future states of the arctic system under various scenarios;
Linkages to the Earth system—linkages and feedbacks between the arctic system and the Earth system; and
Translating research into solutions—informed solutions to the problems caused by environmental change.
Major funding for the conference is provided by NSF, with several U.S. and international partners and co-sponsors, including: the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the U.S. Arctic Research Commission (USARC), the International Study of Arctic Change (ISAC), the Canadian ArcticNet Network of Centres of Excellence, and the European Developing Arctic Modeling and Observing Capabilities for Long-term Environmental Studies (DAMOCLES) program. The Arctic Research Consortium of the U.S. (ARCUS) is organizing the conference on behalf of the arctic community and sponsoring organizations.
Additional sponsors are invited, and interested parties are encouraged to contact Helen Wiggins at ARCUS (helen [at] arcus.org). More information is available on the State of the Arctic Conference website (http://soa.arcus.org).