NGC2007 Newletter -- October 18, 2006 REGISTRATION AND ABSTRACT SUBMISSION Our practice with registration and abstract submission is explained on the registration and abstract submission pages and we also added additional information in the frequently asked questions (FAQ) page. If you have registered but have not submitted the abstract yet, please do so before the deadline: November 1st. At this time we also accept participants without presentation as observers (sponsors, businessmen, reporters, students, etc.), exhibitors or conference organizers. If your abstract is not accepted you still may participate at the meeting with the paid conference fee. We may limit attendance without presentation at a later date, thus you may consider paying the conference fee early to warrant your participation. We have started the review process by reviewing the abstracts of invited talks and those submitted before the initially indicated deadline (October 1st), if the authors requested an early review. All reviewed and accepted abstracts (invited, contributed oral and posters) appear at the following web page: http://asdn.net/cgi-bin/ngc2007/reviewers/abstract-reviewed Abstracts accepted for posters poster presentation are also displayed on the following page: http://asdn.net/cgi-bin/ngc2007/reviewers/abstract-posters If you need a formal letter for visa or funding application that your abstract has been accepted, please, contact Dr. Erica Forzani (e.mail: Erica.Forzani@asu.edu) with the name and address of the presenting author as it should appear on the letter. The letter can be delivered to you as an attached pdf file (with electronic signature), fax or posted by mail. Please, check with the agency you need the letter for which form of the letter is acceptable. Please, keep in mind that the letter sent by mail is more expensive and time consuming for organizers and will take longer to receive. If acceptable, request pdf file or fax. AWARDS We currently have awards for US students. For eligibility, requirements and application, please, visit the following web page: http://asdn.net/ngc2007/awards.shtml We do not have any additional travel assistance programs at this time and if they become available we will notify the registered participants and announce them on our web site. However, we would not advise you to count on these opportunities. Conference support programs are very limited and you may have much better chance to get travel support for our meeting from your own institution or external funding organization on the individual basis. If your abstract is accepted, we will gladly provide you a support letter to a potential sponsor of your attendance at our meeting. INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION We try to provide you timely information and make your communication with our team and organizers easy and reliable. Our conference web site is frequently updated with new information and we foresee some of your questions based on our previous experience with meeting organization. Please, check our web site whether your question has been already answered on one of our pages. Our mail server and data bases are allocated at asdn.net server but fulton.asu.edu server is faster. If for any reason one of the servers may be temporary unavailable, you may still get information from another one. Thus we advise you to save both web addresses in your local browser. Nowadays most servers have one or the other way to protect you from spammers and hackers and we do the same on our side as well and to prevent the personal information about our participants even it is available on their personal web sites. We do not collect credit card numbers and we even require personal request for credit card payments to prevent fraud. These reasonable precautions may lead to some emails being rejected on one or the other sides. We recommend that you use our web mail page to send your questions and requests to the organizers. It ensures your messages are received, and we check the organizers@asdn.net web address daily. For future reference and immediate contact, we also advise you to print and file our contact information listed on the following web page: http://asdn.net/ngc2007/contacts.shtml MEETING PROGRAM After all abstracts will be reviewed by our Program Committee, it will be posted on the conference web site and we will notify you about it to help with planning your conference attendance as we understand that some of you may limit your attendance to less than the whole meeting. However, keep in mind that we plan not only an interesting scientific and business program (we have business section and exhibition as a part of the meeting) but also exciting networking and social events not to mention that our weather in March in Arizona is close to what we may think of one in paradise :) If you have a chance take a few days vacations to explore the Arizona?s natural beauty and/or check some business opportunities in the Wild Wild West. We will gladly assist you with planning your adventures in Arizona! PROOCEEDINGS PUBLICATION Each of our two previous conferences resulted in publication of a book and two journal issues. Our second book is coming out of press soon this month. You may check our previous proceedings from the following web page: http://asdn.net/ngc2007/publications.shtml Our conference proceedings are peer reviewed at the same level as the regular journal articles. Our special issues are advertised on our web site and we actively collaborate with the publishers in advertising our proceedings. Keep this in mind and prepare your manuscripts in advance. We are working with the leading publishers on the publishing agreements and will provide you details as soon as they are available. The manuscripts will be accepted electronically on our or publisher?s web site and at the conference. TRAVEL PLANNING If you need an American visa you may want to start your trip planning early and we will be glad to assist you by providing you a letter confirming your abstract acceptance and receipts for your paid conference fee. Those documents need to be requested! Keep copies of your email receipts, checks and wire transfer and bring them to the meeting. Those who do not need the receipts in advance may request them at the registration desk. Although an early planning involves some risk of cancellation, you may still take advantage of advanced flight booking and convenient reservation for your accommodation. Our regular fee is also subject of reimbursement as specified on the conference fee schedule. The current fee is $400 for regular participants and $200 for full time students (confirmation of full time student status is required) and $100 for the accompanied persons. By requesting the credit card payment access you need specify the amount your pay and the name of the attendee(s). We also offer prepayment (credit) for social and networking events at this time. If you have some questions or may want to get an advice with planning your social program, please contact our social program manager, Ms. Janna Lorenzen (jelorenz@srpnet.com). PROFESSIONAL AND SOCIAL NETWORKING For the meeting to serve one of its main goals ? to meet old and new friends and (potential) coworkers - we try to create the most favorable networking environment. We have long breaks between the synchronized sessions and plan different social and networking events to facilitate informal communication and establishing contacts. We are in the process of negotiation of the place for our meeting night club and we will also developing a networking internet club. Once it is available we will notify you about this exciting networking opportunity. Thank you for joining us at the NGC2007 meeting. We look forward to seeing you in Arizona! NGC2007 Organizers October 18, 2006