Welcome!

Dear Colleagues,

On behalf of the Conference and Technical Program Committees, it is my great pleasure to invite you to the 40th AAAR Annual Conference.  It is scheduled for October 3-7, 2022 at the Raleigh Convention Center in Raleigh, North Carolina.  We expect the Conference to provide an outstanding opportunity to share our latest aerosol science and technology research, while engaging with new and former colleagues.

An exciting array of Plenary Lectures, Special Symposia, Poster Sessions, Oral Platform Sessions, Tutorials, and Special Events will take place from Monday through Friday at 12:30pm.  Our Tutorial Chairs, Yue Zhang and Michael Schuit, have put together a list of 18 Tutorials on a wide range of aerosol science topics.  It is set to include some new topics as well as some of our old favorites.  Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday morning will all start with an 8am Plenary Lecture.  Our outstanding lineup of Speakers includes John Volckens, Sarah Henderson, and Jeff Siegel.  This year we will try something new for Friday by having our Plenary Lecture close the Conference.  This Plenary, which will be delivered by Susanne Hering, will be part of a group of activities the History of Aerosol Science Working Group is helping to coordinate to celebrate 40 years of AAAR.

The technical program will feature parallel Platform and Poster Sessions being seamlessly blended together by our 20 Working Group Chairs and Vice Chairs.  We will have 4 Special Symposia designed to bridge multiple areas and promote cross-disciplinary interaction on the following topics:

1. Biomass Combustion: outdoor/indoor transport and indoor air quality
2. Aerosol Physical Chemistry and Microphysics
3. Aerosol Science of Infectious Diseases: What we’ve learned and still need to know about transmission, prevention, and the one health concept
4. Aerosol sources and constituents of emerging importance and their impacts across spatial scales

Melissa Galloway and Andrew Metcalf from the Education Committee are coordinating 2 Student Presentation Competitions for this year.  We will have our traditional Student Poster Competition.  For the first time, we will also have a Student Oral Platform Competition!  We hope many of you will consider volunteering to be Poster and Oral Platform Judges.

The Exhibit Hall, which will be open from Tuesday through Thursday, will provide opportunities to engage with and learn from leading Companies offering instrumentation and services in aerosol science and technology.  It will also serve as the location for our Welcome Reception and Meet the Job Seekers Poster Session on Tuesday evening.  This Poster Session is for Job Seekers to present their background and expertise to potential Employers across academia, government, and industry, and also for potential Employers to meet the Job Seekers. 

Since we have not all had the opportunity to gather together in the past couple years, we are planning for a Monday evening program and activities following the Tutorials.  This will include a Science Communications Program being organized by Cliff Davidson and featuring Linsey Marr.  On Wednesday morning at 6:30 a.m. we will continue our tradition of a Fun Run lead by Christine McCool.  Joseph Woo, Celia Faiola, and Laura Fierce are planning a special Early Career Event for during lunchtime on Wednesday.  Lupita Montoya, Sunni Ivey, Herek Clack, and Sean Garrick, the members of our new Adhoc Committee for Representation and Equity Affairs, are planning an event for us in the spring as well as during lunchtime on Thursday at the Conference.  On Thursday afternoon, we are organizing a technical tour to the nearby Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) laboratories.  You can sign up for any of these events when registering for the Conference.

Naomi Zimmerman, Shantanu Jathar, Rachel O’Brien, and Marit Meyer are hard at work preparing for our 5^th Annual Fine Particle Arts Competition.  Here you will be able to share your talents for video making and showcase your most beautiful artistic-looking particles.  Prizes will be award for first, second, and third place for the Video Competition and 2 different categories of Particle Art.

As part of an outreach activity, Marwa El-Sayed is helping to arrange for a group of local Undergraduate Students to attend our Conference for 1 day.  In order for AAAR to have a consistent social media presence during the Conference, Anita Avery, Marina Vance, and R. Subramanian from the Internet Committee have launched the Social Media Ambassadors Program.  These graduate students and/or post-docs will help highlight and promote various aspects of our Conference beforehand and during.

A new initiative for this year being organized by Leah Williams, Vice President and Development Committee Chair, is a year long Mentoring Program.  This program aims to develop one-on-one connections between junior and senior members of our community.  It will conclude with a Tuesday lunch event at our Conference being supported by the Presidents Fund.

AAAR will be returning to the Raleigh Convention Center, which is located near downtown, close to many excellent restaurants.  Raleigh is also home to several acclaimed parks and a vibrant museum scene, including the Museum of Natural Sciences, the North Carolina Museum of Art, and the North Carolina Museum of History.  A conference block of reduced rate rooms has been secured at the Marriott Raleigh City Center and the Sheraton Raleigh Hotels.

We are currently planning for an in-person meeting (with a virtual meeting back-up plan).  We will continue to carefully monitor the situation.  We plan to follow all CDC and public health guidelines.  It is anticipated there will be masking and proof of vaccination (or negative PCR test results 48 h in advance) requirements in place.  Our hope is to provide everyone with regular updates as we continue to move forward.  If circumstances preclude an in-person conference in October and we need to switch to a virtual format, I want to assure you that we will still proceed with our usual technical program including Plenaries, Special Symposia, Platform and Poster Presentations, Tutorials, etc.

We look forward to welcoming you in October to the 40th Annual Conference of the American Association for Aerosol Research!

Sincerely,

 

Amy P. Sullivan
2022 Conference Chair