Meeting Announcement - Shelf-Basin Exchange at the Margins of the Arctic: IPY and Beyond

Meeting Announcement
"Shelf-Basin Exchange at the Margins of the Arctic: IPY and Beyond"
4th Shelf-Basin Interactions Pan-Arctic Meeting
26-29 September 2006
Sopot, Poland

For further information, please contact:
Jackie Grebmeier, Director
SBI Project Office
E-mail: jgrebmei [at] utk.edu

The U.S. Western Arctic Shelf-Basin Interactions (SBI) Project Office
and the Institute of Oceanology of the Polish Academy of Sciences
(IOPAS) are pleased to co-sponsor the 4th Shelf-Basin Interactions
Pan-Arctic Meeting to be held in Sopot, Poland, on 26-29 September 2006.
The meeting will be held at the Hotel Haffner with special events at the
nearby IOPAS facility.

The goal of the SBI Pan-Arctic meetings is to encourage open discussion
of arctic science in a forum that will foster international
collaboration on topics relevant "to providing a clear understanding of
the physical and biogeochemical connections between the arctic shelves,
slopes, and deep basin. That understanding will in turn allow realistic
assessment both of the potential responses of the arctic system to
global change, and of the role of these interactive processes on the
global system" (SBI Science Plan, 1998; http://sbi.utk.edu).

The challenge to the 2006 meeting participants is to evaluate and
coordinate developing circum-arctic studies of Shelf-Basin Exchange
(SBE) for both the upcoming International Polar Year (IPY) 2007-2008 and
development of longer-term collaborative international efforts as
planned under the umbrella of the International Study of Arctic Change
(ISAC), Study of Environmental Arctic Change (SEARCH), and the
International Conference on Arctic Research Planning (ICARP) II Working
Group 5 (Arctic margins and gateways) science plan. To this end, the 4th
SBI Pan-Arctic Meeting will focus on two sub-themes:

1. Evaluation of ongoing and planned circum-arctic shelf-basin exchange
   and boundary current studies as part of the "ARCTIC SNAPSHOT" approach
   developed for the IPY (see
   http://sbi.utk.edu/InternationalPolarYear.htm), and

2. Coordination of short-term SBE IPY implementation planning activities
   with proposed longer-term efforts to better evaluate pan-arctic margin
   and gateways dynamics and environmental change (see http://www.iasc.se/).

The meeting format will include 10-15 invited plenary speakers and 30-35
additional participants to a maximum of 50 participants. There is a $100
USD (or EURO equivalent) registration fee to cover coffee breaks,
lunches, and partial meeting expenses. Limited financial support may be
available for young and/or emerging scientists.

For further information (meeting registration form, hotel information),
please visit the meeting website at: http://sbi.utk.edu/meetingsites.htm