[Agenda]    [Planning Committee]

NASA Earth System Science at 20:
Accomplishments, Plans, and Challenges

National Academy of Sciences Building
21st Street and Constitution Avenue NW
Washington, DC
22-24 June 2009

**Open to Media and Public**

A three-day symposium bringing together researchers, managers, and policy makers to examine the 20-year history of the NASA Earth system science program and its future.

Event Sponsors/Hosts: NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Earth Science Division, Washington, DC, in collaboration with the National Academy of Sciences' Ocean Studies Board, Space Studies Board, and Board on Earth Sciences and Resources

By the mid-1980s, NASA was leading the world in developing the notion that observations from space would further the understanding of how Earth's interacting systems function. In 1988, the Earth System Science Committee of the NASA Advisory Council, led by Francis Bretherton, published its landmark report Earth System Science: A Closer View. The report called upon NASA and other agencies to embark on an ambitious program of integrated Earth system science. It became one of the seminal documents for this new field, which integrated studies of Earth's atmosphere, oceans, ice, land, geosphere, and biosphere and the interactions over different temporal and spatial scales. These documents provided the scientific framework for many national and international research programs, including the U.S. Global Change Research Program (subsequently the U.S. Climate Change Science Program).

The Bretherton report spelled out specific plans for observations and models to improve understanding of the Earth system. Many of these observations were new to science, requiring development of innovative technology. Realizing that satellite observations alone would not suffice for the desired improved understanding of the integrated Earth system, the authors called for process-oriented research with complementary in-situ observations and parallel developments of (1) information systems to link and make available to researchers observations from multiple sensors on multiple platforms and (2) new models to express our growing understanding of the complex processes at play in the dynamic Earth system. Inherent in this plan was inspiring the next generation of Earth scientists.

The original ideas, proposed in 1988, that led NASA to develop the ongoing Earth Observing System (EOS) emphasized the inter- and cross-disciplinary research now being conducted using observations and data products from multiple satellite sensors. Twenty years have passed, and the interconnected observational, data management, and modeling systems are achieving many of the goals established earlier. The societal recognition of the rapidity of changes in the Earth over the past decades, the potential for accelerated changes in the future, and the need to consider them in developing public policy have raised the visibility of and public interest in Earth System Science. NASA's capabilities and vision, together with the research community, have expanded to push the observational, modeling, and data management boundaries to usher in the next twenty years of Earth System Science. It is thus time both to look back and look ahead to the future of Earth system science in this era of global change, taking into account the National Research Council's roadmap for the next decade of Earth system science, the 2007 Earth Science and Applications from Space: National Imperatives for the Next Decade and Beyond, and the 2008 Earth Observations from Space: The First 50 Years of Scientific Achievements. What have we learned? Where do the foremost research challenges for the future lie? How well are we prepared to meet them?

To accomplish our goals of looking back and looking ahead, we set aside 22-24 June to host a scientific forum in Washington, DC, during which we will discuss findings and new approaches that will continue the revolution in Earth system science envisioned by Bretherton and his co-authors two decades ago:

• An open forum bringing together researchers and policy makers to examine the history of the NASA Earth system science program and its future.
• An open science meeting to discuss the scientific findings and advances from EOS and other NASA or NASA-partnered Earth science missions that enabled inter- and cross-disciplinary research using data from multiple platforms, with a focus toward how we bring together the multisensor data for Earth system and climate research. A summary of key research results in a special issue of peer-reviewed manuscripts is being considered.
• Press briefings are being planned during the symposium, and a newsroom will be available with press materials and accommodations for interviews.

Please join us as we take a revealing look at our past while charting our future.

Check meeting agenda