Table of Contents
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1. 2014 Mini-GEM: Quantitative Assessment of Radiation Belt 
   Modeling Focus Group Session

2. 2014 Mini-GEM: Outflow Measuring, Modeling, and Merging
   into the GGCM Focus Group Session

3. 2014 Mini-GEM: Special Session on the Van Allen Probes Continuing 
   Mission

4. 2014 Mini-GEM: Special Session on SPEDAS

5. CORRECTION: Dates for GEM Summer Workshops in 2015 and 2016
======================================================================

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                     **   THE GEM MESSENGER   **
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                                                  Volume 24, Number 40
                                                      December 4, 2014
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1. 2014 Mini-GEM: Quantitative Assessment of Radiation Belt 
   Modeling Focus Group Session
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From: Weichao Tu <wtu at lanl.gov>, Wen Li <moonli at atmos.ucla.edu>,
      Jay Albert <jay.albert at us.af.mil>, and 
      Steve Morley <smorley at lanl.gov)
 
The Quantitative Assessment of Radiation Belt Modeling Focus Group 
will hold a session at the Mini-GEM workshop in San Francisco 
on December 14, immediately before the Fall AGU Meeting.
 
Time: 02:20-04:10 PM, Sunday, December 14, 2014
Location: Franciscan II Room, Westin San Francisco Market Street
 
In this session, we solicit short presentations on radiation belt 
modeling and its quantitative assessment, as well as physical 
processes potentially important in radiation belt modeling (such as 
magnetospheric waves, seed electron population, plasma density, 
magnetic field configuration etc.). We are also planning for the “RB 
dropout” and “RB buildup” Challenges, and we encourage you to propose 
potentially interesting events for future quantitative modeling. If 
you'd like to speak in our session, please send your talk title to 
Weichao Tu (wtu@lanl.gov). We also encourage you to attend and 
participate in the discussions.
 
Hope you will join us! More information on the focus group can be 
found 
at http://aten.igpp.ucla.edu/gemwiki/index.php/FG:_Quantitative_Assess
ment_of_Radiation_Belt_Modeling.

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2. 2014 Mini-GEM: Outflow Measuring, Modeling, and Merging
   into the GGCM Focus Group Session
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Daniel Welling <dwelling at umich.edu>

The Outflow Measuring, Modeling, and Merging into the GGCM (OutflowMMM) 
focus group will be holding a single session at this year's Mini-GEM 
workshop on Dec. 13th at the San Francisco Westin Hotel.  We are 
currently soliciting presentations from the community relevant to our 
focus group.  As we enter the final year of our focus group, we will 
be discussing results from our current group modeling effort of the 
September 2002 extended storm event and our recently selected second 
event of late October, 2002.  There will also be a group discussion of 
data-model comparison plans for the period leading up to the GEM 
Workshop in June, 2015.  While all contributions will be welcome, 
presentations relevant to the group modeling effort will be shown 
preference.

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3. 2014 Mini-GEM: Special Session on the Van Allen Probes Continuing 
   Mission
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Barry H. Mauk <barry.mauk at jhuapl.edu>
 
A Special Van Allen Probes Session will be held during the GEM Mini-
Workshop starting at 04:20 on Sunday 14 December 2014 in the 
Franciscan II Room of the Westin San Francisco Market Street, one day 
before start of the science sessions of the Fall Meeting of the 
American Geophysical Union. 
 
A primary purpose of this session is to engage the broader scientific 
community on plans for the continuing and extended mission of the Van 
Allen Probes as the solar cycle evolves into the declining 
phase.  Updated science questions are in the process of being 
formulated as stimulated by prime mission findings, and plans are 
being considered for modifying instrument operations, coordinating 
with other missions (ERG, MMS, etc.), and performing modest changes in 
the orbital configurations.
 
During this session the Principal Investigator teams will review 
investigation status and recent findings, and thoughts and plans about 
extended mission operations.  The Project Science Team will then 
discuss extended mission options and plans. We strongly encourage 
community participation with ideas and feedback.

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4. 2014 Mini-GEM: Special Session on SPEDAS
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Jim Lewis <jwl at ssl.berkeley.edu>

SPEDAS 1.00 (the Space Physics Environment Data Analysis Software), 
supporting loading, plotting, and data analysis for THEMIS, GOES, 
IUGONET, and many other missions, was recently released.  The 
development team will be holding a demo and tutorial session for 
current and prospective SPEDAS users at the mini-GEM meeting, prior to 
this year's Fall AGU meeting. 

The session will be held from 4:20 to 5:00 PM on Sunday, December 14, 
2014, at the Stanford Room of the Westin San Francisco Market Street, 
50 Third Street, San Francisco. 

Immediately after the tutorial, from 5:00-6:10PM, we will hold a 
SPEDAS developers workshop, for those interesting in developing SPEDAS 
plugin modules to load and analyze data from other space or ground 
based missions. 
 
For further information, please contact Jim Lewis 
(jwl@ssl.berkeley.edu), or visit http://spedas.org/wiki/

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5. CORRECTION: Dates for GEM Workshops in 2015 and 2016
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Xia Cai <xcai at vt.edu>

GEM 2015 Summer Workshop:
June 15-19, 2015, at Viceroy Snowmass Resort in Snowmass, Colorado. 
The GEM Student Workshop will be held on Sunday, June 14.) 
(CEDAR 2015 Summer Workshop will be held in the following 
week from June 21 to June 25 in Seattle, Washington.)
 
GEM/CEDAR 2016 Joint Workshop:
June 19-24, 2016, with a joint Student Workshop on Sunday, June 19.


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