It has been a long time since a top-notch international geophysical meeting was last held in Russia. About twenty years ago, during the Peristorika times, a series of international meetings were held, which brought together many foreigner scientists to the Soviet Union. I was fortunate to be invited to two of these meetings in 1988 and 1989 and these encounters have changed my scientific directions in more ways than one and have also impacted the lives of several Russian scientists. After my visit to Moscow this August under the auspices of my Russian colleagues whom I met 20 years before, I felt it timely to invest the time and energy for initiating a unique international workshop next summer, whereby we will bring both Russian ex-patriots who have left Russia in the past 20 years and also top international scientists in several areas in geophysics, which can be threaded together by the common themes of geodynamics, instabilities , rheology , observation, experiments and modern aspects of computation. The objectives of our conference are to (1.) demonstrate to the international community at large of Russia’s future potential role in modern geophysics (2.) show the intergrability of many diverse disciplines to younger scientists from Russia (3.) offer opportunities for many serendipitous encounters for both Russian and foreign participants, in particular the younger members.

We have already done some groundwork together with Dr. Bobby Poliakov on reconnoitering the town of Suzdal, located about 120 km northeast of Moscow. Bobby Poliakov as a banker from Deutsche Bank has extensive connections with the local realtors. We will be able to get choices from several great places. Local scientific organizers will be headed by Professor Alexander Gliko from Institute of Physics of the Earth ( IFZ ) and Russian Academy of Sciences and Dr. Alexey Baranov from IFZ will assist him. On the social side, Dr. Bobby Poliakov will take things under control. He will be assisted by Ms. Anya Kutuzova from Ivanov.They will coordinate the social activities and they have good connections to the local pubs in both Suzdal and in Ivanov. We have already solicited local people, Russian and Russian-American students for helping the foreigners out in language and cultural aspects.

The following themes will be followed in the 4 ½ days in the last week of August, 2009

1. Computational Geophysics (seismology, mantle , core, extreme computing and visualization)

2. Rheology (Crustal, Mantle) and Transport Properties and Fluid Dynamical Instabilities

3. Field and Seismological Observations

There will also be a summary session with round-table discussion.

-David A. Yuen, University of Minnesota, U.S.A.