This project will catalyze collaborations between US and Japanese scientists working on the Tropical Tropopause Layer by convening a bilateral workshop in Honolulu to discuss research and educational questions in this field. This is an underdeveloped area of US-Japan research and is timely. There is significant support of students and young researchers. Significance and importance are that outcomes include better understanding of Tropospheric climate and stratospheric chemistry.
The U.S.-Japan Bilateral Workshop on the Tropical Tropopause Layer sought to enhance and develop new U.S.-Japanese scientific collaborations; to integrate young and future atmospheric scientists into the larger global research community, and to develop and disseminate educational materials on the tropical tropopause layer. In all three of these areas, the proposal team and our collaborators have achieved success. Specifically, we achieved the following outcomes:1) We invited 8 graduate and post-doctoral students from U.S. institutions to attend the Bilateral Workshop, three of whom received NSF funding to support their travel. We also invited 9 U.S. scientists to attend, with 5 receiving NSF funding to support their travel.2) Days 2 - 5 of the workshop focused on identifying the most important scientific issues in the tropical tropopause layer. The discussions included existing plans for field measurement campaigns and our current understanding of the science. Students worked to synthesize these topics, align key science questions with the field campaigns, and present their results to the larger scientific audience at the Workshop. All discussions and presentations at the workshop appear in the digital archive and are available to the general public at scholar.valpo.edu/ttlworkshop.3) A proposal was submitted by workshop attendees and organizers (BATTREX) to NSF in June 2012 to fund a balloon measurement field campaign centered at Manus, a key location in the Western Pacific region from which productive studies of the tropical tropopause layer had already taken place. This proposal would have resulted in additional data for scientists in ATTREX (U.S.), SOWER (Japan), and CAST (U.K.). Funding was decined, however, and a subsequent, revised proposal could not be submitted in time for the project to be relevant to the already scheduled field campaigns.4) The entire workshop is archived on the website (see above). To our knowledge, this is the first and most complete digital archive of a workshop or conference proceedings using the Berkeley Press system. The site has received 5,999 total page hits by 4,221 unique visitors who have downloaded 2,697 unique pages/documents and viewed videos posted on YouTube associated with the workshop 142 times. Hits come from 6 different countries (U.S., U.K., Germany, Japan, India, and Indonesia). 5) The materials on the workshop web archive include all the presentations from Day 1, when leading scientists provided the current state of knowledge of the study of the tropical tropopause layer in the Western Pacific. These resources were incorporated into the Tropical Meteorology course at Valparaiso University in the Spring 2013 semester, and 7 of 19 respondents to our survey of participants at the Bilateral Workshop indicated that they had used the web resources in an educational setting.6) The grant leadership team published 3 articles summarizing the workshop in widely read scientific publications. Our digital archive specialist gave one conference presentation and has authored one publication on the value and process of archiving this workshop. Attendees at the original workshop cited 8 publications that derived from information presented at or collaborations developed at the workshop.7) The American Geophysical Union special session at the Fall 2013 Meeting provided a natural follow-up to the Oct. 2012 Bilateral Workshop. The session attracted 36 papers, with authors from the U.S., Canada, and Japan; 14 authors attended the original Workshop; 8 authors were Japanese; 10 authors were students, including 3 from Japan. We estimate an attendance of 50 at the oral session. In a follow-up survey to this session, two respondents indicated that new collaborations developed as a result of this session, with 4 respondents indicating the session led to publications (two already published and two in press or under review).8) Ten of 19 respondents ot our survey of Workshop participants indicated that the workshop resulted in new collaborations; 13 of 19 respondents indicated that the workshop made the likelihood of their personal engagement in collaborative projects between Japan and the U.S. more likely or much more likely, with the balance "remaining the same." Survey responses also indicate that attendees knowledge of the scientific subject matter was deepened, that new collaborations developed, and that understanding of Japan-U.S. cultures was enhanced.The U.S.-Japan Bilateral Workshop in Hawaii and the special session on the tropical tropopausel layer at the Fall 2013 Meeting of the AGU provided gatherings of world experts in the science of the tropical tropopause layer furthered international collaboration, particularly strengthening U.S.-Japan collaborations. In addition, the forums provide outstanding opportunities for current students to engage those world experts on their own research projects, and have their questions about the science answered directly.Furthermore, funding for this project led to the development of the tools necessary to create a complete digital archive of the workshop proceedings which can be found on the web by the general public. This model can be reproduced for future such events, whether scientific or not.
