As the ILTER Network matures around the world, many countries have developed regional associations to increase interaction among neighbors with cultural and scientific affinities as well as common ecosystems that span their political borders. All four of the regional ILTER groups are holding meetings in the next few months to report on their LTER activities and to improve the basis for scientific collaboration within and outside their regions. Further details of these meetings are or will be available via the ILTER web site at http://www.ilternet.edu/meetings
ILTER network members and interested parties in the Central European region held their inaugural meeting last fall in Poland, and will meet again in Budapest in late June just before the "World Conference on Science" sponsored by UNESCO. The meeting will focus on finding ways to improve networking among researchers in the neighboring scientific communities from Poland, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, the Slovak Republic, Hungary, and Romania. Funding received from the International Division of NSF will enable a group of US scientists to participate in an associated workshop focused on promoting long term ecological research collaboration in the Carpathian Basin.
North America has formed the newest regional network. At a meeting held in November 1998, representatives from the US and Canadian LTER Networks and a group of Mexican scientists and officials who are planning their national network decided to work together on mutually agreed projects. This group will hold its first formal meeting during the ESA meeting in Spokane, Washington. In addition, they have organized a public workshop scheduled on August 7th at the ESA meeting, entitled "Formation of a North American Regional LTER Network: cross-site research opportunities for Canada, Mexico and the U.S."
The East Asia-Pacific LTER networks will hold their third meeting in Seoul, Korea in mid-October. A group of US LTER scientists with particular interest in research in Asia has requested support from the International Division of NSF to participate in a research oriented workshop associated with this meeting, with the hope of advancing plans for some specific US-Asian collaborative LTER projects.
The fifth meeting of the LTER Networks of the Latin American region is now being organized for October. The Alexander von Humboldt Institute, sponsor of the Colombian national LTER network, will be the host of this meeting.
Published:
Apr 7, 1999