About LunGradCon

The 14^th annual Lunar and Small Bodies Graduate Forum (LunGradCon 2023) will be held in-person on July 17^th in Salon G of the Hotel at the University of Maryland, located at 7777 Baltimore Avenue, College Park, Maryland. Light food and refreshments will be provided at the beginning of the day. For lodging, a group discount will be provided at the hotel with NESF.

LunGradCon 2022 intended to enhance the professional development of graduate students in lunar science by providing an opportunity to present and discuss scientific research in an environment of their peers. As such, the conference was both planned by and restricted to current graduate students.

Following the broad interests of the Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute (SSERVI), the scope of LunGradCon includes both lunar and small body science. LunGradCon provides an opportunity for grad students and early-career postdocs to present their research on lunar and small body science in a low-stress, friendly environment, being critiqued only by their student and recent graduate peers. In addition to pre-recorded oral presentations, the forum presents opportunities for professional development and networking with fellow grad students and postdocs, as well as senior members of SSERVI.

LunGradCon will address the following research topics of the NASA Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute:

• Dust/Regolith and Plasma
• Geology and Geophysics
• Volatiles/Exospheres
• Missions and Human Exploration

The LunGradCon speaker schedule can be found here.

Registration

If you are interested in attending or presenting at LunGradCon 2023, please fill out the registration form. Registration will be open from Monday, March 15th through May 31st. For more details, please see the LunGradCon linktree.

Conference Format

Abstracts are due to lungradcon@gmail.com by midnight on May 31^st.

Talks will be 8 minutes in length.

After each speaker is done, the session chairs will open the floor to questions from the audience about any of the topics in the session, and general discussion will be encouraged.

Each day will also have poster session, grouped by the different topics delineated above. Please follow the NESF guidelines for poster size/format. More information will be provided regarding the format and schedule for poster presentations.

Abstracts

Abstracts must be emailed to lungradcon@gmail.com until May 31^st, 11:59pm PDT. Decisions on abstracts will be given in June.

Future forums

The 14th annual LunGradCon 2023 will be held on July 11th and 17th, 2023 in a hybrid format at the Hotel at the University of Maryland.

Previous forums

The 1st annual LunGradCon 2010 was held on Sunday, July 18, 2010 at the NASA Ames Research Center.

The 2nd annual LunGradCon 2011 was held on Sunday, July 17, 2011 at the NASA Ames Research Center.

The 3rd annual LunGradCon 2012 was held on Sunday, July 15, 2012 at the NASA Ames Research Center.

The 4th annual LunGradCon 2013 was held on Wednesday, July 10, 2013 virtually.

The 5th annual LunGradCon 2014 was held on Sunday, July 20, 2014 at the NASA Ames Research Center.

The 6th annual LunGradCon 2015 was held on Monday, July 20, 2015 at the NASA Ames Research Center.

The 7th annual LunGradCon 2016 was held on Tuesday, July 19, 2016 at the NASA Ames Research Center.

The 8th annual LunGradCon 2017 was held on Monday, July 17, 2017 at the NASA Ames Research Center.

The 9th annual LunGradCon 2018 was held on Monday, June 25, 2018 at the NASA Ames Research Center.

The 10th annual LunGradCon 2019 was held on Monday, July 22, 2019 at the NASA Ames Research Center.

The 11th annual LunGradCon 2020 was held on Wednesday, July 1 and Thursday July 2, 2020 virtually.

The 12th annual LunGradCon 2021 was held on Wednesday, July 15 and Thursday July 16, 2021 virtually.

The 13th annual LunGradCon 2022 was held on July 11th and 12th, 2022 in a hybrid format at the University of Colorado, Boulder.

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