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			 **   THE GEM MESSENGER   **
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						     Volume 11, Number 18
						     June 11, 2001

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2001 GEM Snowmass meeting -
Final Call: Tail/Substorm Observations Working Group
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From: Mark Moldwin (mmoldwin at igpp.ucla.edu)
      Shin Ohtani (ohtani at fluxgate.jhuapl.edu)

The substorm community currently is studying the causal relationship
between processes in the mid-tail and the near-geosynchronous orbit
(NGO) region during substorm onset. The debate can be summarized as
attempting to understand the relationship of mid-tail reconnection
(the near-Earth-neutral-line (NENL) model) with processes in the NGO
(current disruption model). The Tail/Substorm Observations Working
Group will focus on clarifying the observations used to understand
those processes. Two invited speakers (Erickson, Voronkov) will
describe the observational evidence for substorm onset initiation
occurring in the near-Earth geosynchronous region while Shiokawa and
Kepko will summarize the observational evidence for substorm
initiation beginning in the mid-tail.

The goal is to determine if the controversy is due to examination of
different datasets or different interpretations of the same datasets.
We hope these reviews will stimulate discussion on how to derive an
experiment to help resolve this issue. We invite everyone who is
interested in this topic to participate.  Short presentations are encouraged.
Please contact one of the organizers if you would like to make a contributed
presentation.

GEM will be held June 17-22, 2001
(http://gem.rice.edu/~gem/gem2001/gem_2001.html).

Shin Ohtani (ohtani at fluxgate.jhuapl.edu), Mark Moldwin (mmoldwin at igpp.ucla.edu)

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