International Workshop on Land Surface Multi-spheres Processes of Tibetan Plateau and their Environmental and Climate Effects Assessment
August 8-11, 2016 Xining, China – Download Full Meeting Announcement
Announcement:
The First International Workshop on Land Surface Multi-spheres Processes of Tibetan Plateau and their Environmental and Climate Effects Assessment will be held on August 8-11, 2016 in Xining, China.
Background:
The Tibetan Plateau (TP) is a unique geographic region including the Himalayas and other surrounding mountain ranges. The TP is the highest and most extensive highland in the world and exerts a huge influence on regional and global climate and hydrology through dynamic, mechanical, and thermal forcing mechanisms. The headwater areas of many major rivers in the eastern part of Asia are located in TP. Therefore, surface conditions over the TP have always been an important research topic in earth science. In the past several decades, significant progress has been achieved in understanding the conditions of TP’s surface and climate through both observational and theoretical researches. Meanwhile, new scientific problems have been identified and require further in-depth studies. In the 21st century, understanding the TP’s role in the global climate and environmental variability and change has become more prominent and has gained more scientific attention in light of the global warming. The unique interactions among the land surface multi-spheres (cryosphere, hydrosphere, lithosphere, biosphere and anthroposphere) over the TP and their interactions with atmosphere significantly influence social and economic development of surrounding countries.
With the improvement in field measurements, remote sensing techniques and integrated observations, the TP scientific research is likely to experience a critical period of rapid development. It is also imperative for academic community to make an assessment on the Tibetan environment.
The workshop on Land Surface Multi-spheres Processes of Tibetan Plateau and Their Environmental and Climate Effects Assessment aims to bring together professionals from world in different disciplines to exchange ideas and research findings to broaden the interdisciplinary collaborations on these aspects of the TP scientific researches, and to bridge existing knowledge gaps for international and interdisciplinary collaborations, and to make an assessment of the Tibetan environment.
This workshop will focus on the understanding of TP’s climate and environment (both paleo and contemporary), cryosphere, lithosphere, and terrestrial surface conditions and the regional and global impact of their interactions on the TP regions and global climate and environment using both observational and modeling approaches. The workshop topics include, but are not limited to, climate and environmental changes and variability, especially those associated with Asian monsoons, over TP and adjacent regions, regional climate predictions and future projections, hydrological and energy cycles and their anomalies, climate change and its impacts, TP atmospheric circulation features and anomalies, interactions between Asian monsoon and surrounding oceans, source, transport and spatial/temporal distributions of aerosols and their effect on cryosphere and climate, remote sensing applications in analyzing and understanding these processes, and parameterizations of the TP land surface processes and their utilities in climate and weather prediction models.
Themes:
Overarching themes of the workshop include but are not limited to:
1. Regional and Global Implication of Land Surface Multi-spheres Processes over TP
a) Characteristics of circulation, energy and hydrological cycles and other physical processes
over TP and impacts of their interactions on the monsoon system
b) Applications of ground measurements, proxy records (ice core, lake sediment), stable
isotopes, major ionic chemistry, as well as remote sensing in analyzing and understanding
land surface multi-spheres processes
c) Parameterization of surface characteristics over TP and its application in regional climate
predictions; evaluation of climate models’ performances over TP
d) Aerosol-cloud- radiation interactions over TP and their climate impact
e) Ecosystem dynamics, climate change and anthropogenic impact on TP
f) Cryosphere and hydrological processes on TP and their impacts
2. TP Environmental Assessment
a) Land surface multi-spheres processes over the TP: past changes, current conditions and
future projections at different scales
b) Interactions among land surface multi-spheres, their consequences and impact on society
over the TP
c) Societal strategy to the changing TP environment