Minutes from the meeting of the Organizing Committee of the IAU
Commission 22 held in Barcelona on June 12 and 15, 2007
Present: P. Spurný (president), J. Watanabe (vice-president), J.
Borovička (secretary), P. Brown, P. Jenniskens, A. Pellinen-Wannberg
(June 12 only), V. Porubčan, I. Williams
Absent: J. Baggaley, G. Consolmagno, H. Yano
Invited guests: B. Cook, D. Janches (June 15 only)
1. Meteoroids 2010 conference
The Committee was informed about the proposal of B. Cook to hold the
next Meteoroids conference at the Marshall Space Flight Research
Center, Hunstville, Alabama, USA. Later on, the Committee was also
informed about the proposal of D. Janches to hold the conference in
Boulder, Colorado, USA or a nearby mountain resort. B. Cook proclaimed
that he will be able to support the conference financially even if it
is held in Colorado. The Committee decided by a majority of votes to
hold the conference in Colorado. The dates of the conference should
ideally be a few weeks before the planned re-entry of the Hayabusa
spacecraft (June 2010). D. Janches, as the future chair of the LOC, was
asked to collaborate on the scientific program of the conference with
J. Watanabe, the future president of Commission 22.
Since there were misunderstandings concerning the procedure of
proposing the organization of the Meteoroids conference, the Committee
asked the president to explain the role of the Commission during the
closing ceremony of the Meteoroids 2007 conference. The formal
procedure will be also explained on the web page of the Commission.
2. Commission report
The Committee regrets that the report of Commission 22 for the period
2002-2005 was published in a much abbreviated form only. The next
report should conform to the standards established in the previous
periods. The anticipated deadline is August 2008. The persons
responsible for preparing individual sections will be named at the
beginning of 2008. P. Jenniskens suggested that the sections are
organized by scientific goals instead of by observational technique.
3. Merging with Commission 21
I. Williams informed about the current legal status. Commissions 21 and
22 will merge in 2009 unless there are good reasons to convince the
Division III for aborting the merge. J. Watanabe informed that
Commission 21 is currently quite passive. The Committee expressed the
readiness of Commission 22 to expand partly the field of the Commission
and take over the responsibility for the subjects covered currently by
Commission 21, which concern the Solar System. Such an expansion would
not necessitate a change of the name of Commission 22.
4. Future IAU Symposia and Joint Discussions
I. Williams suggested proposing both a Joint Discussion and a Symposium
to be held during the XXVIIth General Assembly of IAU in Rio de Janeiro
in 2009. Any proposal for Symposia and Join Discussions must be of
interdisciplinary nature. The proposal should be supported by the
president of Division III and at least one additional division
president (most likely of Division I). Good proposals are welcome and
may be sent to the Commission president (P. Spurný). The
deadline for the Letter of Intent is September 15, 2007. The deadline
for the final proposal is December 1, 2007. Note that Commission 22
already supported a proposal for the Symposium named "Icy Bodies in the
Solar System", submitted by J. Fernández (Commission 20).
5. Web pages of Commission 22
The pages of Commission 22 are located at the address
http://meteor.asu.cas.cz/IAU/ and are maintained by J. Borovička. They
are not yet in their final form. Any contributions are welcome.
6. Planned conference on Bolides and Meteorite Falls
P. Spurný informed about the intention to organize a small
conference (~50 participants) on Bolides and Meteorite Falls in the
Czech Republic in 2009. The conference will commemorate the 50th
anniversary of the Příbram meteorite fall, the first
scientifically observed meteorite fall (April 7, 1959). The Committee
supported that intention. The date and site of the conference was
briefly discussed.