The International Symposium Triangle '98
Lorenz Magaard
(University of Hawaii, Honlulu, HI96822 USA)
The International Pacific Research Center (IPRC) is very pleased and honored to be a co-sponsor of this important symposium. The IPRC is a very young organization. It was established at the University of Hawaii (UH) in our School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology (SOEST) on October 16, 1997. Its mission is
to provide an international, state-of-the-art research environment to improve understanding of the nature and predictability of climate variability and regional aspects of global environmental change in the Asia-Pacific sector.
The scientific architects of the IPRC are Professor Roger Lukas of SOEST and Professor Toshio Yamagata of The University of Tokyo. Established under the U.S.-Japan Common Agenda for Cooperation in Global Perspective, current work in the IPRC is mainly funded through a cooperative agreement between UH and the Japan Marine Science and Technology Center (JAMSTEC) and the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) which concerns the efforts of the Frontier Research System for Global Change at the IPRC. The National Aeronautics & Space Administration (NASA) also supports the IPRC and other U.S. Federal funding agencies are expected to join in to a growing degree.
As mentioned before, the IPRC is a very young organization. Nevertheless, we are hoping to make a contribution to this symposium. There are seven IPRC members and two affiliate members of the IPRC here. There are also three of the eight IPRC SAC (Scientific Advisary Committee) members participating in this symposium. We hope to be active participants in the discussions, especially of climate related observational programs such as CLIVAR, GODAI, and the planned Basin-wide Extended Climate Study (BECS).
Again, the IPRC is pleased to be represented here as a new player in climate studies in the Asia-Pacific region.
