Mar 18 2009
More than 900 geoscientists will gather soon for the 44th Annual Meeting of the Northeastern Section of the Geological Society of America, held this year in conjunction with the Maine Water Conference. Hosting organizations include the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of New England, the Maine Geological Survey, the Department of Geosciences at the University of Southern Maine, the Department of Geology at Bates College, The University of Maine, and the Geological Society of Maine. The meeting will take place at the Holiday Inn by the Bay in Portland, Maine.
An overarching theme for the meeting is climate change, and the keynote presentation, Climate Change: Realities, Surprises and Opportunities, by Paul Mayewski, Director of the Climate Change Institute at the University of Maine, reflects that theme. The keynote address, which is open to the public free of charge, will take place on Sunday, 22 March, at 5:30 p.m. in the New Hampshire-Vermont rooms, Holiday Inn by the Bay. A symposium and several themed sessions will also focus on this topic.
Technical sessions will highlight cutting-edge scientific research and feature presentations on such topics as:
- The vulnerability of salt-marsh ecosystems to sea-level rise;
- Better understanding the role of arc collisions in orogenesis and developing research around the relationship between surface-lithosphere dynamics in collisions;
- Road salt, arsenic, and other environmental contaminants in hydrologic systems; and
- Geoarchaeology as a tool for better understanding of human societies, culture, and environment.
Maine Groundwater: Sustainable Aquifer Use through Monitoring and Regulation will be the topic of a morning-long session on Sunday, March 22. With Maine’s water resources often in the news, presentations by state and private geologists will shed light on how groundwater is monitored and regulated. View the session details at http://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2009NE/finalprogram/session_23370.htm
Six themed sessions will run jointly with the Maine Water Conference and will cover diverse issues ranging from water quality and the demand for groundwater resources to watershed habitat restoration and managing aquatic ecosystems.
More than 480 presentations will be made by academic and industry scientists, undergraduates and graduate students.
To view the technical program, visit http://www.geosociety.org/sectdiv/northe/09mtg/techprog.htm.