9314106 Lerch This Americas Program award to the American Physics Society (APS) will help to support a hemispheric meeting of physics societies in Cancun, Mexico. The meeting, which has been organized by the APS, the Sociedad Mexicana de Fisica (SMF), and the Canadian Association of Physicists (CAP), represents a major first step in a plan designed to strengthen collaboration among all the physics communities in the western hemisphere. The conference is the first trilateral meeting of physics societies and furnishes an opportunity to consolidate links with other physics societies in the hemisphere, including the Federacion Latinoamericana de Sociedades de Fisica (FELASOFI), an umbrella organization for Latin American physics societies. At the same time it will help to advance current plans of the APS and the SMF to develop an expanded directory of physics programs in the hemisphere, to appoint representatives to subcommittees of the sister society, and to develop closer collaboration in educational programs. Furthermore, by bringing together physicists from the hemisphere and from Europe to participate and report on their work in thirteen broad areas, the meeting will provide an opportunity for the exchange of knowledge and the initiation of collaborative projects. The Physics Division and the Division of Materials Research are cost sharing in this international award. ***
