Commission F-Wave Propagation and Remote Sensing

Chair: Mr. M. P. M. Hall (UK)

Vice-Chair: Dr. Yoji Furuhama (Japan)

The Commission held three Open Business Meetings, respectively on 16, 18, and 20 August 1999. Copies of the agenda were made available and of the Commission F report to Council for 1996-99 (to be published in the September Radio Science Bulletin). The following items were discussed at the meetings:

Member Committee Representatives had had the opportunity to vote for Vice-Chair by mail, but were again given the opportunity to vote (or to change their vote) at the GA. Credentials of those voting were checked. The following names were proposed to the Council, in order of preference:

The Commission confirmed its wish that Dr. Furuhama would become Chair at the conclusion of the General Assembly. The Council subsequently confirmed the appointment of Dr Furuhama and Prof. Hallikainen.

Commission F organised 10 scientific oral sessions of invited papers and one large poster session. Session names and convenors were as follows;

Having all invited papers distinguishes Commission F sessions at General Assemblies (GAs) from those at the Triennial Open Symposia held the year before Gas.

Joint sessions were:

Commission F tutorial lecture was:

Before the regular scientific sessions of the GA, Commission F had organised three Workshops:

The regular sessions had a well balanced technical content and also were geographically well balanced. However there was concern that the quality level was not so high for some papers and that the whole meeting had been too busy.

Mr. Hall informed that Dr. W. R. Stone (USA) sought from each commission an Associate Editor to solicit two papers per year (e.g. radiowave propagation and remote sensing for Commission F), and to arrange full refereeing. Certain papers at conferences might be a starting point. Dr. K. Andersen (USA) volunteered to do this. People were urged to get their libraries to subscribe.

In this Toronto GA, 7 days duration was introduced. All Commissions had been invited to give their opinion and Commission F confirmed its preference by a show of hands as to whether the format of the next GA should be 7 days as this time or 10 days as the previous one. Answers of Commission F representatives were slightly in favour of the present duration of 7 days.

Mr. Hall said there had been a strong recommendation for commissions to have Ad Hoc Nominating Committees to solicit and generate nominations, and to then select a slate of three candidates who would agree to serve if elected. However, all Commission F representatives, including several ex-Commission F chairs, expressed the wish to keep the present selection procedure in Commission F and not to change as proposed. This was later accepted in Council.

It was agreed to keep them as they were.

Mr. Hall said there had been a lot of discussion on this in Council and that Commission F was noted for its good interaction with ITU-R Study Group 3 and its Working Parties. However, there was now some activity in trying to promote contacts between other Commissions and Study Groups. It was important to recognise the major work of IUCAF in relation to protecting radio frequency interests of those in remote sensing and radioastronomy, as had been reported in the Radio Science Bulletin. (See also Section 7.4.)

Mr. Baptista (The Netherlands) said that there was need for a statement about the frequency bands for Earth exploration. Prof. Boerner (USA) spoke on the importance of reserving several frequency bands below 10GHz for SAR. Commission F made two recommendations: F.1 "Support for EES (Earth　Exploration Services) spectrum management" and F.2 "Allocation and sharing of frequencies within the MF/HF/VHF/UHF bands".

Commission F was sponsor or co-sponsor of 21 meetings between the 1996 and 1999 URSI GAs. Below are shown meetings, locations, dates and Modes (where Mode A has the name of URSI and logo, but no URSI money; Mode B has a grant (typically 2000 US$) from Commission F, but only for participation of individual scientists, mainly from developing countries or the New Independent States; Mode C is a major conference with direct involvement of URSI headquarters in management and budget with significant support (typically 5000 US$), and share in any profits).

The main Commission F meeting between URSI General Assemblies is the Commission F Open Symposium, held this time in Aveiro, Portugal on September 22-25, 1998 (Mode B).

Commission F, as usual, co-sponsored with the IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Society three International Geoscience Remote Sensing Symposia (IGARSSs), all as Mode A; these, the largest remote sensing meetings, continue to draw nearly 1000 papers. IGARSS’97 was held in Singapore on August 3-8, 1997, IGARSS’98 was held in Seattle, Washington, USA on July 6-10, 1998, IGARSS’99 was held in Hamburg, Germany on June 28-July 2, 1999.

CLIMPARA’98, the third in the series, was held in Ottawa, Canada in April 27-29, 1998 (Mode B). Again it was followed immediately by ITU-R Working Party meetings and was a focus of relations with ITU-R Study Group 3.

In addition, the International Symposium on Radiowave Propagation (ISRP) was held in Qiangdao, China on August 12-16, 1997 (Mode B), the Eighth International Workshop on Technical and Scientific Aspects of MST Radar (MST8) was held in Bangalore, India on December 15-20, 1997 (Mode B), the Physics and Engineering of MM and SubMM EM Waves meeting was held in Kharkov, Ukraine on September 15-17, 1998 (Mode B), and the Workshop on Radio Methods for Studying Turbulence was held in Urbana, Illinois, USA on August 9-12, 1999 (Mode B). A meeting on Microwave Signatures in Remote Sensing was initially planned to be held in Moscow, Russia on March 11-13, 1998, but this Symposium was cancelled at short notice and the grant returned in full.

Other Mode A meetings co-sponsored with other groups, including other URSI commissions, were the International Symposium on Antennas and Propagation (ISAP’96), held in Chiba, Japan, on September 24-27, 1996, the International Conference on Antennas and Propagation (ICAP’97), held in Edinburgh, UK, on April 14-17, 1996, Radio Africa’97, held in Nairobi, Kenya, on August 4-8, 1997, the Urban Radiowave Propagation Symposium (URPS’97), held in Tomsk, Russia, on September 2-4, 1997, the 1998 International Wireless and Telecommunications Symposium/Exhibition (IWTS’97), held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on May 11-15, 1998, the European Conference on Synthetic Aperture Radar (EUSAR’98), held in Friedrichshafen, Germany, on May 25-27, 1998, the International Workshop "Day on Diffraction’98", held in St. Petersburg, Russia, on June 2-4, 1998, the COSPAR Scientific Assembly, held in Nagoya, Japan, on July 12-19, 1998, PIERS’98, held in Nantes, France, on July 13-17, 1998, the 10^th Microcoll, held in Budapest, Hungary, on March 21-25, 1999, and the International Workshop "Day on Diffraction’99", held in St. Petersburg, Russia, on June 1-44, 1999.

Most of the following meetings were mentioned during Commission F business meetings, but a few have been added since.

There were several opinions about the venue for Commission F Triennium Meeting and Climpara’01. We would like to continue these discussions by e-mail.

Mr. Hall emphasised the importance of the role of Commission F representative in organising meetings, namely:

For all Mode: ensure URSI involvement clearly, logo etc., especially in Call for Papers, etc.: participate in organising committee, especially for technical program; provide call-for-papers and report on the meeting for URSI’s Radio Science Bulletin: and keep Commission F Chair fully informed of developments.

For Mode B: organise invitation and funding of URSI-supported scientists; possibly speak in opening session, banquet, etc; report to URSI Bulletin and Secretariat, copied to Commission F Chair.

For Mode C and for major Mode B events being organised exclusively by URSI: arrange for registration frees to be reduced by 30 US$ for all URSI correspondents, the 30 US$ paid by non-URSI correspondents to be remitted to URSI headquarters with a list of those who paid it. Those paying then become URSI correspondents and receive the Radio Science Bulletin, etc.

Many proposals for sessions have been put forward by Dr. J. P. V. Poiares Baptista (The Netherlands), Prof. W-M. Boerner (USA), Dr. T. Tjelta (Norway), Dr. R. L. Olsen (Canada), Dr. J. Lemorton (France), Dr. D. Noon (Australia), Dr. D. T. Gjessing (Norway), Dr. B. Arbesser-Rastburg (The Netherlands), Prof. M. T. Hallikainen (Finland), and Dr. J. Fr. Hjelmstad (Norway). These proposals will need rationalisation and grouping together.

In the business meetings, it was felt that, in view of the Triennial Open Symposia (covering all Commission F topics areas), it was appropriate to maintain the Commission F tradition of having compact invited-paper sessions on specific subjects and allow a broader allocation of contributed papers as posters. There should be 8 oral sessions, each with two less papers per session followed by discussion, having 4 sessions for propagation and 4 sessions for remote sensing. It was agreed that it had been well worth using the opportunity to hold Workshops in 1999, but that they were too separated from the sessions held in the following week. Any such workshops in future would be part of the main program.

Up to now, several people expressed their interest in joint sessions with Commissions of B, C and D. However, it was felt that time would allow only one session on this.

None were proposed in the business meetings, but Mr. Hall requested proposals be sent to Dr. Furuhama. The tutorials were felt to be of general interest and good for young scientists.

Mr. Hall mentioned that these automatically end at a General Assembly unless renewed by Resolution to Council. It was felt that results from Working Groups should be made known through the Radio Science Bulletin, as well as in reports to the Council.

It was agreed to continue WG GF.1 (Middle atmosphere) with Prof. J. Röttger (Germany) as co-ordinator and Prof. C-H Liu (China, SRS) as the Commission F representative.

It was also agreed to continue WG GFA1, but with the designation and title slightly changed to "WG FG.1: Atmospheric and Ionospheric Remote Sensing using Global Positioning Systems (GPS/GLONASS)" with Mr. J. P. V. Poires Baptista (The Netherlands) as co-ordinator and Dr. P. Hoeg (Denmark) as Commission G representative.

Commission F interests are looked after by Prof. M. T. Hallikainen.

Commission F to be represented by Mr. J. P. V. Poaires Baptista and Dr. G. Rochard (France).

Mr. J. P. V. Poaires Baptista to be the formal member, with the representation at a meeting depending on where that meeting is to be held.

Mr. Hall mentioned the progress of chairs meeting about relations between URSI and ITU. The outcome was that the Scientific Committee for Communications (SCT) was to be reactivated. However there was no time to enter into details. In general, the currently retiring Commission Chairs were being proposed to serve on the STC in its early stages and it was agreed that Mr. Hall represent Commission F on this basis.

It was agreed to continue the policy of having review chapters corresponding to most General Assembly session topics and for the session convenors to write the chapters; it was also agreed that the new Vice Chair be the editor for Commission F.

The Council had decided that future publication of the RRS be on CD-ROM for distribution to the attendees at the General Assembly, with hardbound books produced for sale to libraries, institutions, and those who specifically want a paper book.

Mr. Hall expressed appreciation for the work undertaken by Dr. R. L. Olsen (Canada) and by the national representatives in preparing material for the disk of references for Commission F. Dr. Olsen mentioned the big task of preparing the disk and felt it was not realistic to retain the present method anymore. Considering that the perceived value from the disk is not commensurate with the very substantial amount of time required on the part of the Commission Disk Editor and others involved in preparing it, the Council subsequently concluded that preparation and publication of the Disk should not be undertaken for the next triennium.

The equivalence of MRS (Modern Radio Science) will in future be published in RSB (Radio Science Bulletin)

There had been much paperwork for Commission Chairs and Session Convenors that should be avoided in future. The Standing Committee on Publications had recommended that the current book of one-page abstracts be replaced by three-to-four page summaries, made available by electronic media and distributed at the GA on CD-ROM

Mr. Hall commented on the difficulty of contacting some Member Committee Representatives and the fact that certain Member Committees did not even have Representatives for Commission F (as was also the case for other Commissions). He also commented on the need to make known the activities of Commission F within the various countries, some of whom had national meetings and some of whom did not.

It was noted that Mr. Hall had been appointed as Coordinator for the Scientific Program for the next General Assembly. He would welcome comments sent to him directly.

Dr Furuhama introduced a proposal for publication in "Radio Science" (RS). He had been invited to serve as a guest editor for setting up a special section for publication in RS on the most important areas of research in the area of URSI Commission F as we enter the 21^st Century. He proposed that several authors of Commission F chapters for "Review of Radio Science" in Toronto GA and some appropriate members, perhaps session convenors, should revise the contents by adding new information which appeared in this GA and prepare manuscripts for RS. He would prepare an introductory note for the special section.