Date: Mon, 6 Feb 2006 15:06:08 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Great Observatories Workshop -- May 2006


-------------------------------------------------------------------------
               FIRST ANNOUNCEMENT - 6 February 2006
          -- MAKING THE MOST OF THE GREAT OBSERVATORIES  --
		 May 22-24, 2006      Pasadena, CA
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Chandra, HST and Spitzer observatories are sponsoring a workshop to
be held at the Pasadena Hilton from May 22-24 2006. The primary goal is to
focus the astronomical community's attention on the scientific priorities
for the Great Observatories over the next few years.
We want to emphasize both joint/multi-mission scientific programs, and
programs that lay foundations for the future.  Key questions
we hope to address are:

* What are the pressing issues of the day?
* What would we really regret not doing with Chandra/HST/Spitzer before
   the missions end?

The workshop, which will be limited to no more than 120 participants,
will combine a series review talks, each covering a broad area of
astrophysics outlined as follows:


* Planets and planetary systems
* Stars: the main-sequence and beyond
* Nearby galaxies and stellar populations
* Galaxy formation and the high redshift universe
* Star formation and the ISM
* Galaxy clusters and the IGM
* AGN and QSOs
* Cosmology

Confirmed speakers include Ed Churchwell, Rob Kennicutt, Megan Donahue,
Niel Brandt, and Jim Leibert.

Each review talk will be mirrored in breakout discussion sessions,
designed to enable active participation by all attendees. We will also
hold a panel-led general discussion that will focus on preparing for the
science programs that will be undertaken by future ground- and space-based
projects, including ALMA, Con-X, JWST, Herschel, GSMT, VISTA and LSST.

Confirmed panelists include Harry Ferguson, Ann Hornschemeier, Massimo
Stavelli and Lisa Storrie-Lombardi. Jeff Hayes, the NASA Program Executive
for Chandra, Hubble and Spitzer, will provide a 'View from Inside the
Beltway' on Wednesday morning.

The meeting will also accommodate poster presentations, with time for
brief (1 minute) oral summaries.  There will be no plenary contributed
talks, although we encourage participants to
prepare key arguments for the individual discussion sessions.

For more information please go to:
http://ssc.spitzer.caltech.edu/mtgs/greatobs.
Meeting registration will open February 22, 2006.