Town Hall Meeting
Bering Ecosystem Study (BEST) Program
ASLO/TOS Ocean Research Conference
Hawaii Convention Center, Room 323B
Honolulu, Hawaii
Thursday, 19 February, 2004
5:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
For more information regarding the BEST Program or the Town Hall
Meeting, please contact:
Dr. George L. Hunt, Jr.(glhunt [at] uci.edu)
The Bering Ecosystem Study (BEST) Program will hold a Town Hall meeting
during the American Society of Limnology and Oceanography and The
Oceanography Society (ASLO/TOS) Ocean Research Conference on Thursday,
19 February 2004 from 5:00-8:00 p.m. in Room 323B of the Hawaii
Convention Center. All those with interest in this developing research
program are welcome to attend. During the Town Hall meeting, there will
be a brief presentation on the Draft Science Plan and an opportunity for
questions and feedback on ways of making the plan more responsive to
community needs.
Your comments are requested as part of the community review process for
the Bering Sea Ecosystem Study (BEST) Science Plan. To download a copy
of the draft science plan, see:
http://www.arcus.org/Bering/science_plan.html
Please submit comments by Monday, 1 March 2004.
Recent, unprecedented changes in the marine ecosystems of the eastern
Bering Sea and the lack of information about the possible linkages
between these changes and climate forcing resulted in a planning process
during the past year to assess needs and plan for a large-scale,
integrated study of the Bering Sea.
The intent of the BEST science plan is to outline a multi-year research
effort that will provide improved understanding of the effects of
climate variability at various temporal and spatial scales on the
ecosystems of the eastern Bering Sea. The BEST Science Plan provides
background information and frames science questions that serve as
guidelines for integrated, interdisciplinary studies of the marine
ecosystems of the eastern Bering Sea. The proposed studies focus on the
mechanisms and processes that determine the biological production of the
Bering Sea ecosystems and the fate of this production as it is
transferred through the ecosystem to upper trophic level consumers,
including humans.
It is anticipated that the science plan will be followed by an
implementation planning process and that, if funding and ships are
available, the field program could begin in summer 2006.
This Draft Science Plan is being circulated widely in the national and
international science communities for review.
For more information regarding the BEST Program please contact:
Dr. George L. Hunt, Jr. (glhunt [at] uci.edu)
TO OBTAIN A COPY OF THE DRAFT SCIENCE PLAN
The PDF of the science plan is available for download at:
http://www.arcus.org/Bering/science_plan.html
REVIEW INSTRUCTIONS
If you would like to comment on the BEST Science Plan, please email your
comments to ARCUS (best [at] arcus.org) by 1 March 2004. All review comments
should be clearly referenced by chapter number, subsection number,
paragraph number, sentence number within the paragraph, or by sentence
fragment. If you are suggesting major changes to the contents of a
section, send revised text to replace the existing text.
If you have a full version of Adobe Acrobat version 5 or 6 you can
annotate your comments within the PDF document using commenting feature.
Please e-mail your comments to best [at] arcus.org either in the body of the
e-mail or as an attached Word document. If you prefer, you may write
comments directly on a hard copy of the document and fax it to
907-474-1604, as long as the recommendations are clearly legible and
comprehensible. Please make sure your comments are not so close to the
margin that they will be cut off by the fax.