This award is to continue support of the International Global Atmospheric Chemistry (IGAC) Core Project Office (CPO). The CPO is responsible for the project's administration, acting as a communication hub between the scientific steering committee (SSC), leaders of IGAC activities, and the larger atmospheric chemistry community; maintaining the IGAC web page; organizing and editing the IGACtivities Newsletter; and working with the SSC to identify opportunities for IGAC to advance atmospheric chemistry research. IGAC also provides organizational support and limited funding for workshops, and hosts a biennial conference. Broader impacts play a large role in this project, and include communication of results to the larger atmospheric science community and the general public, international collaboration and coordination, and education and training through the involvement of young scientists in workshops and conferences.
The goal of IGAC is to provide an international framework for planning and implementing activities on atmospheric chemistry that demand human, technological, or monetary resources beyond the capacity of single nations, and that specifically address the overarching scientific questions: 1. What is the role of atmospheric chemistry in amplifying or damping climate change? 2. Within the Earth System, what effects do changing regional emissions and depositions, long-range transport, and chemical transformations have on air quality and the chemical composition of the troposphere? IGAC is now adding emphasis on new scientific areas such as: connecting mega-city emissions to regional-to-global scale impacts; processes that control upper troposphere/ lower stratosphere chemical composition; air/ice chemical interactions; more detailed studies of long-range transport and chemical transformation; and chemistry/climate feedbacks.
