MIST is an informal community of UK-based scientists with interests in physical processes within the Sun-Earth system and other planets. This includes studies of the mesosphere, ionosphere, thermosphere and magnetosphere of Earth and of other planets and the solar wind. The role of MIST is to help promote these interests to the public, wider scientific community and other stakeholders as well as provide a platform for scientists to present their work to the rest of the UK community. Regular bi-annual meetings are organised: a one day meeting in London in the autumn, sponsored by the Royal Astronomical Society, and an out-of-town meeting each spring. Reports of meetings have been published in the RAS house journal Astronomy & Geophysics, and its predecessor Quarterly Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society.
The first MIST meeting was held in London on 20 August 1970, so we are well into our second quarter century! Henry Rishbeth, who with Peter Kendall was one of the originators of MIST, wrote an authoritative account of the origins and history of MIST to mark the 25th anniversary: The MISTs of Time.
From its inception, MIST has been strongly linked with and supported by the Royal Astronomical Society. All MIST scientists are invited to join the RAS. More information.
On the 21 January 2008 a MIST business meeting was held at the RAS offices in London. Richard Wade of STFC addressed the meeting and took part in a question and answer session. To Prof. Wade's credit he stayed long after the agreed time. A report on the meeting will appear on these web pages in due course. A significant outcome of the business meeting was the formation and passing of three resolutions regarding the current funding crisis and the manner in which STFC has handled relations with the community and the formation of the strategy delivery plan.
The full text of the three resolutions are available here:
All statements in each resolution were passed unanimously. The associated actions were passed overwhelmingly with only one vote against for the final action.
These resolutions reflect the strength of feeling in the MIST community about the current crisis and communicate our deep lack of faith in STFC given their conduct throughout this affair.
This year the spring MIST meeting will once again be held jointly with the UKSP and NAM meetings following on from the successful 2007 meeting in Preston.
Dates: 31 March - 4 April 2008
Venue: , Belfast
An outline timetable is also available
To send a mail to the MIST mailing list see these instructions. There are currently (4 November 2007) 305 subscribers to the electronic mailing list.
The MIST mailing list uses the JISCMAIL system; this is the National Academic Mailing List Service provided by JANET(UK).
The old MIST mailing list (mistmist.ac.uk) is currently being run in parallel but will be retired in the near future. Please subscribe to the new list if you are not already.
In the past, paper MIST Newsletters were published at intervals (the latest one in July 1998), and mailed out to a circulation of about 200. With the advent in September 1998 of the electronic MIST mailing list for the rapid and convenient dissemination of MIST News, the paper Newsletter is redundant and its circulation has been discontinued. Electronic MIST Newsletters have been published occasionally and are stored here for posterity:
Public outreach is an important aspect of STP. The UK MIST community has several programmes that highlights the work that we do:
Last updated 24th January 2008.
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