AMOS 2021
BAMOS April 2021
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and Insurance Australia Group ’ s Joanna Aldridge gave us insights into how the AMOS sciences can have impact beyond the research community . And no AMOS conference would be complete without the Bureau of Meteorology ’ s Blair Trewin providing his annual review of the previous year ’ s climate and significant weather events .
Specific days of the conference also took on special significance . The International Day of Women and Girls in Science , on the Thursday of the conference , allowed us to recognise the contribution of female scientists in our field . In particular , the Bureau of Meteorology ’ s Acacia Pepler was awarded the Meyers Medal and spoke about changes to Australian weather systems across the 21st century . The Friday of the conference was also especially significant , though tinged with sadness . On this day , we reflected on the unexpected recent loss of two of our community ’ s outstanding and highly respected scientists . UNSW ’ s Sarah Perkins-Kirkpatrick gave the inaugural Penny Whetton Memorial Lecture , introduced by Penny ’ s wife Senator Janet Rice , on the science of identifying the contribution of climate change to extreme climate events . The afternoon ’ s land surface processes session was dedicated to Vanessa Haverd , acknowledging her major contributions in land surface and carbon modelling .
Conference panel sessions included the first of a planned series of regional World Climate Research Programme ( WCRP ) Climate Research Forums . The forum at the conference exchanged ideas around new activities and opportunities being developed by WCRP and explored ways that the WCRP community of scientists , partner programs , funders , and end-users of climate science can engage in the Australian region . Panelists included Helen Cleugh , Vice Chair of WCRP ' s Joint Scientific Committee , Monash University ’ s Christian Jakob , UNSW ’ s Sarah Perkins- Kirkpatrick and Nick Wood of the consultancy Climate Policy Research .
Parallel sessions during the conference were highly varied and included old favourites and new foci . As one might expect from a conference themed ‘ Science for Impact ’, some of the new sessions concerned the application of the AMOS
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sciences . However , there were new sessions related to the fundamental science as well . For example , two new sessions focused on marine heatwaves and biogeochemistry . These proved to be excellent opportunities to strengthen the links between scientists at all career levels working in these rapidly developing fields .
It was delightful to see some 150 students and Early Career Researchers participated in the conference , giving extremely professional presentations . AMOS continued the tradition of recognising the quality of student presentations by awarding prizes for the best student oral and poster presentations . These went to the University of Tasmania ’ s Danielle Udy for her talk ‘ From Antarctic ice core and Australian rainfall ’ and the University of Adelaide ’ s Thomas Chambers for his poster ‘ Holographic observations of clouds from a balloon platform ’.
Of course , a great conference doesn ’ t just happen . Firstly , it has to be financed . This conference was fortunate to have the generous financial support of both long-term and new partners . Namely , Vaisala , the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate Extremes , the NSW Government Office of the Chief Scientist and Engineer , the Victorian Government Department of Environment , Land , Water and Planning , the Bureau of Meteorology and the CSIRO Marine National Facility . Secondly , a conference has to be organised . In this , the conference convenors were tirelessly supported by the AMOS team : Jeanette Dargaville , Angela Maharaj , Thomas Kavanagh , Melissa Lyne , Roger Dargaville and Natasha Rice . To run a great virtual conference also required help from those with online event know-how . The AMOS team had the technical support of conference event managers , EventFrog .
Final thanks must go to the conference participants themselves , including the many presenters in different time zones who had to get up at , or stay up until , unsociable hours to join us . The willingness of so many to enthusiastically participate in the new online format meant that the conference was a great success and an important forum for the AMOS community to come together after a very tough year .