Dear All,

We warmly invite your participation in the following American Geophysical Union 2006 Fall Meeting Session (http://agu.org/meetings/fm06/).
Abstract submissions are now open at:

http://submissions4.agu.org/submission/entrance.asp

This promises to be a really exciting session, and we look forward to welcoming as many of you as possible in San Francisco.

Best wishes,

Edward Hanna & conveners 

U09 (Union) "Polar regions: past, present, and future changes and synthesis of their role in the modern Earth System"
Conveners: Edward Hanna, James Hansen, Larry Hinzman, Kathryn Moran, Don
Perovich, and Charlie Vörösmarty

7th September, 2006 (23:59 UT) deadline for abstracts!

The polar cryospheric, biological, climatological, hydrological, atmospheric, oceanographic, and terrestrial domains are fully coupled and hence require a synthesised approach to improved knowledge and understanding. For example, atmospheric circulation patterns change seasonally and have complex interactions with ocean circulation, sea ice, and land-surface energy and water fluxes. A wide range of environmental changes occurring over the last few years to millennia in polar terrestrial and marine regions have been documented. Impacts of a recently warming climate are increasingly evident. Are these climatic trends producing substantive impacts on ecosystems, social structures,
geomorphology or other physical or biological processes? The recent,
substantial loss of Arctic sea ice, especially in coastal and marginal seas, is affecting regional climate and marine and terrestrial ecosystems. The timing of river runoff will be impacted by earlier spring melt events and degradation of permafrost, likely influencing sea ice formation. These land-atmosphere-ocean-ice feedbacks extend far beyond coastal regions and influence the Southern and Arctic Oceans as well as the global ocean system. Recent analyses of periodic atmospheric phenomena such as the NAO, AO and ENSO suggest interconnections among the major land, ocean, and atmospheric components of the larger synthesised polar system. Salinity anomalies originating with freshwater pulses from the Arctic have had oceanographic, climatic, and economic consequences beyond the Arctic Ocean, extending to the North Atlantic. Recent paleoclimate findings from the Arctic Ocean revealed a warmer than expected Arctic climate during the Paleocene/Eocene Thermal Maximum
(PETM) extreme warming period. These results also support the concept of past bipolar climate change, suggesting an Arctic that is both sensitive and responsive to greenhouse gases.

This session seeks presentations from multiple disciplines that examine
documented changes or trends in a broad array of environmental variables
including (but not limited to) the areal coverage and mass balance of ice and snow cover; vegetation and land-cover change; ocean salinity, temperature, circulation and sea ice dynamics; storm frequency and intensity; forest fires, human and wildlife population variations; and possible causes of variation (natural climatic change/global warming). We invite presentations that use models, integrated observations, paleoclimate records, statistical inference and process studies of polar ocean/atmosphere processes to synthetically address and understand polar regions' role in the climate and larger Earth system. We will also consider policy issues of interest relating to the need for multi-national collaborations in polar research and to improve the public's awareness of high-latitude climate processes and change. Because the polar regions are vast and sparsely populated, integrated system studies there are relatively new, so there is much we do not know. Developing a sound predictive capability of climatic change and system level responses, despite sparse data and the regions' severe climate, is challenging. The fate of global climate may be very much dependent upon gaining a better understanding of the forcings,
feedbacks and processes in the Arctic. We are seeking presentations on research that examine evidence of high latitude change and/or contribute to our understanding of polar regions as a system. Studies emphasising the synthesis of major system elements are sought.