Information & Documentation Related to the National Science Foundation Arctic System Science (ARCSS) Program

Information & Documentation Related to the National Science Foundation Arctic System Science (ARCSS) ProgramARCSS Program Goals The Arctic is highly complex, with a tightly coupled system of people, land, ocean, ice and air that behaves in ways that we do not fully comprehend, and which has demonstrated a capacity for rapid and unpredictable change with global ramifications. The Arctic is pivotal to the dynamics of our planet and it is critical that we better understand this complex and interactive system. As conceptualized during the 2002 ARCSS All-Hands Workshop, and as stated in the recent NSF announcement of arctic research opportunities, the goal of the NSF ARCSS Program is to answer the question: What do changes in the arctic system imply for the future? To address this question, researchers must: Advance from a component understanding to a system understanding of the Arctic; Understand the behavior of the arctic system—past, present and future; Understand the role of the Arctic as a component of the global system; and Include society as an integral part of the arctic system. In the sixteen years since its inception, ARCSS Program research has become increasingly integrative, rather than disciplinary, with an expanding synthesis focus that aims to achieve system-level understanding of the Arctic. Overarching science questions relevant to the synthesis effort include: How do the interconnected social, physical, chemical, and biological systems of the Arctic operate and interact to define and drive the arctic system (broadly defined)? How does the arctic system interact with the larger earth system? What is the trajectory of the arctic system and the implications of that trajectory in the years and decades to come? Addressing the ARCSS Program goal and related science questions will require continuation and expansion of the broader community dialogue and input that has characterized the ARCSS Program from its inception. Communication and collaboration between and among the ARCSS research community (including Communities of Practice), the ARCSS Committee, and the National Science Foundation (NSF) is critical for the most productive use of ARCSS research and research funding.ARCSS History 1984 The U.S. Committee for the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP) developed a global change program that included the study of ice and snow, paleoclimate, and the polar regions; several members suggested that the Arctic could be a "test bed" for an integrated global change program in the United States and Canada. Between 1985 and 1988, members of the arctic research community briefed the National Science Foundation (NSF) and other national and international organizations on the importance of the Arctic in the global system and the value of an interdisciplinary arctic program as a developmental paradigm for global change science. 1987 Two workshops on the Arctic in Global Change were convened, and the results were published in Arctic Interactions: Recommendations for an Arctic Component in the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (1988). 1988 In 1988, NSF funded the Arctic Research Consortium of the United States (ARCUS) to organize a follow-on workshop to implement the arctic interactions program; the concept of an Arctic System Science (ARCSS) Program was developed. The ARCSS initiative was established by NSF as a contribution to the U.S. Global Change Research Program with the Division of Polar Programs (DPP, now the Office of Polar Programs) as the lead division. 1989 Largely because of funding schedules, the implementation of ARCSS occurred at component and project levels. The already planned and funded Greenland Ice Sheet Project Two (GISP2) program was folded into the ARCSS Program along with a new program, Paleoclimates from Arctic Lakes and Estuaries (PALE). These two programs deal with records of past climate change in the Arctic with emphasis on records of the last 2,000, 20,000, and 150,000 years. The Divisional Advisory Committee included both programs in the DPP Long-Range Science Plan with staggered start dates and suggested funding scenarios. The GISP2 drilling program began in 1989, and PALE was implemented in 1991. In subsequent negotiation, NSF's Ocean Sciences Program assumed initial control of the oceans portion of the ARCSS Program. 1991 The ARCSS research community devised a management structure for the integrated ARCSS Program which included Science Steering Committees for the individual components and an oversight and integrating panel. As part of the developing infrastructure, ARCUS established the ARCSS Program Office in 1991 at the request of NSF and arranged planning meetings for the overall ARCSS Program and for LAII. The two ARCSS programs implemented in the early 1990s concern modern interactions and processes: Ocean-Atmosphere-Ice Interactions (OAII) and Land-Atmosphere-Ice Interactions (LAII). The Joint Oceanographic Institutions (JOI) organized workshops to develop a research plan for OAII; ARCUS did so for LAII. The results of these workshops were distributed to the scientific community for comment. JOI published Arctic System Science: Ocean-Atmosphere-Ice Interactions (1990). ARCUS published Arctic System Science: Land/Atmosphere/Ice Interactions (1991) and Arctic System Science: Advancing the Scientific Basis for Predicting Global Change (1990) and convened a meeting of agency representatives and others to present the program. JOI published the Arctic System Science: Ocean-Atmosphere-Ice Interactions Initial Science Plan (1992), and the first OAII projects were funded. 1992 NSF held the first LAII competition. Because the total cost of the interdisciplinary, integrated proposals greatly exceeded funds available, the NSF proposal-review panel selected certain portions to form an integrated but more limited Flux Study. 1993 The ARCSS Panel considered the conceptual structure and implementation strategy of ARCSS. ARCUS supported meetings to further define OAII, LAII, the LAII-Flux Study, and PALE. The composition and name of the ARCSS Panel were changed in 1995, following recommendations from an ad hoc ARCSS community working group advising on the community representation and advisory aspects of the panel's role. The panel became the ARCSS Advisory Committee and, later, simply the ARCSS Committee. ARCUS began coordinating discussions and community planning for a research program on the human dimensions of the arctic system in 1993. 1994 NSF initiated Synthesis, Integration, and Modeling Studies (SIMS) in 1994. The ARCSS Committee developed recommendations for SIMS as a research emphasis within ARCSS in 1995 and published a community announcement for the 1 June 1996 NSF-OPP Arctic Research Program deadline. 1997 ARCSS has three linked ongoing components. Ocean-Atmosphere-Ice Interactions (OAII) and Land-Atmosphere-Ice Interactions (LAII) deal with modern interactions and processes among ocean, atmosphere, and ice, and among land, atmosphere, and ice, respectively. Paleoenvironmental Studies work with the records of past climate change in the Arctic, emphasizing the last 2,000, 20,000, and 150,000 years. This component is implemented through two projects: Paleoclimates from Arctic Lakes and Estuaries (PALE) and Greenland Ice Sheet Project Two (GISP2), administered within the Earth System History initiative of the United States Global Change Research Program. A research prospectus for a fourth component, People and the Arctic: A Prospectus for Research on the Human Dimensions of the Arctic System (HARC), was published by ARCUS in 1997; announcements of opportunity are expected shortly for this component, which considers human activity as an integral part of the whole arctic system, both as a vital driver of climate change and as a link among the terrestrial, marine, and climate subsystems. ARCSS also supports the integration of research results across components and projects within ARCSS as well as with other arctic research programs through Synthesis, Integration and Modeling Studies (SIMS). This ARCSS Committee served until 2010, after which it was merged with the Study of Environmental Arctic Change (SEARCH) Program Understanding Environmental Change task team, as both groups were funded by ARCSS and wrestling with the same issues. Archived Messages from the ARCSS Committee Note #13 (2013): Recommendations for Successful Arctic System Science (PDF - 85 KB) Note #12 (7 August 2008): eTown Meeting Announcement: Changing Seasonality (PDF - 67 KB) Note #11 (20 November 2007): ARCSS Committee Meeting Notes (PDF - 86 KB) Note #10 (29 June 2007): ARCSS Committee Meeting Notes (PDF - 99 KB) Note #9 (7 May 2007): Arctic System Synthesis Workshop Summary (PDF - 73 KB) Note #8 (20 November 2006): ARCSS Committee Recommendations on Data Management (PDF - 82 KB) Note #7 (16 November 2006): ARCSS Committee Meeting Notes (PDF - 120 KB) Note #6 (20 September 2005): ARCSS Synthesis eTown Meeting (PDF - 66 KB) Note #5 (01 August 2005): Call for Communities of Practice (PDF - 48 KB) Note #4 (15 April 2005): Update on ARCSS Program Planning and Upcoming Community Events (PDF - 63 KB) Note #3 (04 April 2005): ARCSS eTown Meeting Announcement (PDF - 54 KB) Note #2 (31 January 2005): Dear Colleague (PDF - 128 KB) Note #1 (02 August 2004): Community Input on Synthesis (PDF - 48 KB)

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