Next week (4–8 May) thousands of Earth, planetary and space scientists will participate in EGU2020: Sharing Geoscience Online, the largest-ever virtual geoscience meeting. This pilot project, which will replace the EGU General Assembly 2020 in Vienna, will allow scientists from around the globe to discuss their research and latest findings.

As part of this event EGU will, for the first time, host three virtual press conferences. Interested journalists, science bloggers, filmmakers and public information officers are welcome to participate in these and all other activities throughout the week.

Sharing Geoscience Online is free for all participants. You need only provide a name and email address to receive the links to join the press conferences as well as ten keynote Union Symposia and Great Debates, all of which will be live streamed on Zoom. Anyone who is unable to view these sessions live can instead watch the recordings, which will be posted to EGU’s YouTube channel 1–2 days following each event.

Contents

• Press conference schedule
• Live streaming
• Meeting programme
• Programme highlights

Press conference schedule

Press conferences during Sharing Geoscience Online will last no more than one hour each. All times are CEST (Central European Summer Time).

Documents relating to the press conferences listed below, including the featured abstracts and presentation slides, will be made available via the Sharing Geoscience Online media portal during the meeting.

PC1. Centennial perspectives: A celebration of Marie Tharp’s legacy (Tuesday 5 May, 16:00 CEST)
PC2. Epic journeys: New insights into wildlife and human migrations (Wednesday 6 May, 16:00 CEST)
PC3. Journey to the Centre of the Earth (Wednesday 6 May, 17:15 CEST)

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CENTENNIAL PERSPECTIVES: A CELEBRATION OF MARIE THARP’S LEGACY
Tuesday, 5 May, 16:00 (Stream)

Marie Tharp’s pioneering contributions to seafloor mapping helped reveal Earth’s submarine landscape, from the mid-ocean ridge system to trenches and transform faults, in unprecedented detail. Her contributions with Bruce Heezen led to an understanding of seafloor spreading and played a key role in the acceptance of the theory of plate tectonics. This press conference will honour Tharp’s achievements and examine how her life’s work has revolutionised our understanding of Earth’s oceans.

Participants:
Vicki Ferrini
Research Scientist, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, United States
Mathilde Cannat
Marine geoscientist, Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris, France
Paul Wessel
Professor, SOEST, University of Hawai’i at Manoa
Florian Schmid
Postdoctoral researcher, GEOMAR – Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Germany

Related scientific sessions: TS14.1/GD6.8, TS6.4/GD6.4/SSP2.17, TS6/2

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EPIC JOURNEYS: NEW INSIGHTS INTO WILDLIFE AND HUMAN MIGRATIONS
Wednesday, 6 May, 16:00 (Stream)

Whether by land, by air, or by sea, many wild animals make extraordinary long-distance journeys. Ancestral, and even some modern, humans have likewise undertaken equally impressive odysseys across and between continents. In this press conference journalists will hear how variability in soil nutrients may help drive migrations of more than a million wildebeest and hundreds of thousands of zebras and antelope in the East African Serengeti. Another team will present new results on the use of low-cost sensors to detect the vocalisations of individual African Bush Elephants to monitor their movements in South Africa. We will also hear how a group of researchers is testing forecasts of present-day human migrations in response to climate change, research that could soon increase the effectiveness of much-needed humanitarian aid.

Participants:
Oliver Lamb
Postdoctoral researcher, Department of Geological Sciences, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, United States
Philippe Gaspar
Mercator-Ocean, Operational Oceanography
Eileen Eckmeier
Professor, Department of Geography, LMU Munich, Germany
Lisa Thalheimer
PhD student, Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford, United Kingdom

Related scientific sessions: GI1.1, SSS8.8, NH9.6, SSP1.9/GM10.4

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JOURNEY TO THE CENTRE OF THE EARTH
Wednesday 6 May, 17:15 (Stream)

Inspired by the work of geologist Charles Lyell, Jules Verne penned this classic example of ‘subterranean fiction’ in which the characters descend into the planet’s interior, witness battling prehistoric creatures, and experience many more adventures before returning to the surface via an eruption of Italy’s Stromboli volcano. This lighthearted press conference will guide journalists on an equally enthralling exploration of a fantastic fossil discovery, new results from studies of the Earth’s interior, and findings from Mount Stromboli’s 2019 eruptions.

Participants:
Malcolm Hart
Emeritus Professor, School of Geography, Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Plymouth, United Kingdom
Anne Davaille
CNRS Research Director, University of Paris-Saclay, France
Paula Koelemeijer
Royal Society University Research Fellow and Proleptic Lecturer, Department of Earth Sciences, Royal Holloway University of London, United Kingdom
Filippo Zaniboni
Senior Assistant Professor, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Bologna, Italy

Related scientific sessions: SSP1.1, EOS7.1, ITS5.2/OS4.13/EOS10.2/BG3.18/GM6.6/HS11.63, GD2.1/EMRP1.24/GMPV4.2/SM4.12, NH5.1

Live streaming

All press conferences will be live streamed via Zoom and available for everyone to watch. You can watch the press conferences by clicking the respective ‘Stream’ links above. A day or two after each event is over, the ‘Stream’ links will lead to the recorded press conference videos on EGU’s YouTube channel.

Ten keynote symposia and debates will also be live streamed: see this article for links to these sessions and more information.

Meeting programme

All sessions and more than 17,000 abstracts that make up the EGU2020: Sharing Geoscience Online programme are available online on the main meeting website.

The programme is searchable by scientist name, keywords (e.g.: Greenland, turtle), session topic (e.g.: climate, planetary sciences), and other parameters.

Programme highlights

Of highlight this year is the session Best practices for scientific integrity and scientific freedom in an age of pandemics – and beyond (Co-sponsored by AGI, AGU, AOGS, GSA, GSL, and JpGU) on Monday afternoon. If you’d like to interview any of the speakers, please inform Terri Cook, EGU’s Head of Media, Communications and Outreach, at media@egu.eu.

Other Union-wide sessions, including great debates, that could be relevant for media participants are:

• Are forests a solution to climate change?
• The future of Earth and planetary observations from space
• Geosciences and UN Sustainable Development Goals: Pathways for the future
• Managing our mineral resources for a sustainable future: The role of earth scientists

If you’re interested in watching these or any of the other ten keynote symposia and debates that will be live streamed, see this article for links to these sessions and more information.

In addition to these sessions, journalists searching for newsworthy research to report on may wish to check these sessions of media relevance as well as the attached list of individual abstracts selected by the EGU press officer.

Reporters may also find the list of papers of public interest, selected by session conveners, useful.

The European Geosciences Union (EGU) is the leading organisation for Earth, planetary and space science research in Europe. With our partner organisations worldwide, we foster fundamental geoscience research, alongside applied research that addresses key societal and environmental challenges. Our vision is to realise a sustainable and just future for humanity and for the planet. We publish a number of diverse scientific journals, which use an innovative open access format, and organise topical meetings, and education and outreach activities. Follow the EGU on Twitter and Facebook.

If you wish to receive our press releases via email, please use the Press Release Subscription Form at https://www.egu.eu/news/subscribe/. Subscribed journalists and other members of the media receive EGU press releases under embargo (if applicable) 24-48 hours in advance of public dissemination.

• Sharing Geoscience Online media page
• Sharing Geoscience Online general info page
• Scientific programme