This proposal seeks funding for partial support of a conference focused on Earth system science in the Uinta Mountains of northeastern Utah. The Uinta Mountains are a fascinating natural laboratory for the study of Quaternary climate changes, landscape evolution, and geoecology. The mountain range contains a federally designated wilderness area spanning nearly half a million acres, and is administered by three different National Forests. Over the past decade, numerous academic researchers have forged innovative collaborations with land managers working on these National Forests, which have greatly improved our understanding of previously overlooked aspects of the Uinta land system. This work began in the mid-1990s with a dedicated program of geomorphic mapping that formed the basis of a Forest Service land systems inventory. From that starting point, research has expanded in a multitude of directions, encompassing topics as diverse as Quaternary geochronology, periglacial landscape evolution, paleolimnology, post-glacial climate changes, treeline fluctuations, fluvial geomorphology, and forest ecology. The addition of new researchers and the establishment of new research programs have been particularly rapid over the past five years, with the result that more than a dozen academic scientists are actively pursuing funded research in the range, including two multi-year projects supported by the National Science Foundation. The results of this work have been presented in more than 10 peer-reviewed papers, and have considerable relevance to ongoing studies elsewhere in the central Rocky Mountains. Intellectual Merit: The vibrant nature and breadth of current research in the Uintas is exciting and presents considerable potential for interdisciplinary collaboration. However, the large number of researchers focused on so many varied topics is inhibiting the efficient communication of research goals and results necessary for the development of future collaborations. This is not the fault of any individual research group, but rather the inevitable outcome of an increasingly specialized scientific community in which researchers with different interests attend different meetings and follow different literature. As a result, the great potential for innovative interdisciplinary research in the Uintas will remain unrealized until these artificial barriers between disciplines are overcome and robust connections can be made between research groups with complementary interests. The weekend conference described in this proposal, UINTAS 2006"The Uinta Interdisciplinary Assessment Symposium, will address this situation by greatly enhancing communication between the academic research groups currently active in the Uintas. Through presentation of research overviews and results, and focused planning sessions, a foundation will be constructed for the next generation of innovative, interdisciplinary, projects. The conference will also highlight ways to better connect academic research with the needs of land managers to ensure that the history of fruitful collaboration between academe and the Forest Service will be maintained. Broader Impacts: The concept for this conference has met with great enthusiasm from the research community currently active in the Uintas, and from the U.S. Forest Service, which is providing the majority of the funding. Forest Service land managers are particularly excited about the potential for this conference to become a model for how government land management agencies may better coordinate their needs with the interests of academic researchers. As such, this conference has great potential for impacts beyond the community of researchers currently focused on the Uintas. Furthermore, it is expected that approximately 16 presentations will be made on aspects of Earth system science in the Uintas at the conference. These presentations will be collected and published as a special issue of the journal Arctic, Antarctic, and Alpine Research, ensuring that the conference presentations, and the results obtained to date by the different research groups, will be readily available to the broader scientific community.
