Credit: Anna Kotova (distributed via imaggeo.egu.eu) [Imaggeo – Geoscience].

 

Dear EGU Planetary & Solar System Sciences (PS) Division,

The Planetary & Solar System Sciences blog is back! In this post, we will examine how to participate in defining the PS Division, activities, procedures, and deadlines.

We dedicate our comeback post to our readers, who sit at the heart of this community. The EGU Planetary & Solar System Sciences (PS) Division is built by volunteers, for the community it serves. The more colleagues who contribute, the better our Division can represent and reflect our diverse voices. Every contribution matters, and regardless of your availability or experience level, there are opportunities for you to help shape our Division. Below, we summarize the main engagement opportunities within our Division.

 

EGU General Assembly

The annual EGU General Assembly is Europe’s largest and most prominent geosciences event, which attracts around 20,000 scientists from all over the world.

The scientific sessions cover all disciplines in the Earth, planetary and space sciences, including oral, poster and PICOs (interactive presentations that combine the advantages of both orals and posters). Aside from the disciplinary sessions, which cover topics selected by each scientific Division (or programme group), the meeting also features many Union-wide sessions. These include Great Debates and Union Symposia, inter- and transdisciplinary sessions, medal lectures, short courses, and Education and Outreach sessions.

The General Assembly remains, above all, an opportunity for scientists to stay up to date on topics of interest and an unmissable annual occasion for networking and new collaborations, as well as a way to reconnect with researchers and professionals working across Europe and the rest of the world.

Abstracts and other open-access uploaded materials from all previous General Assemblies are available on EGUsphere, the Union’s central repository for open-access scientific materials. The General Assembly features a job centre, artists-in-residence, and a newsletter, EGU Today, which highlights sessions, events, and exhibitions each day of the meeting. These and other activities, as well as the scientific sessions, are often announced on GeoLog, the EGU blog, as well as EGU’s social media channels. The EGU General Assembly also organises press conferences in a dedicated Press Centre at the meeting.

 

EGU General Assembly 2027 session proposal

The next EGU General Assembly in Vienna (April 4–9, 2027) is now in preparation, and the call for session proposals is open until September 23rd 2026.

We ask for your support in preparing the PS programme with new scientific session ideas whether to existing sessions or new ones. A variety of possibilities are available: scientific sessions, short courses, geopanels, ad-hoc meetings, and improvements to previously proposed sessions, including topics of interest to the PS Division and hot topics for the planetary and space science communities. Our goal is to help the PS Division members to have the best experience EGU can offer. When preparing a proposal, please always review the EGU convener rules and recommendations, as they evolve over time.

How many conveners can be included in the proposal? Session proposals require a convener team of 2 to 5 members. Convener rotation for recurring sessions is highly encouraged. The convener teams shall be diverse across gender, career stage (with explicit inclusion of Early Career Scientists), and institutional/geographic affiliation. Teams fulfilling all three criteria automatically receive the EGU Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) session logo once all members update their online EGU profiles. Note that conveners cannot serve as session chairs during the time block in which they are giving an oral presentation; however, they can be co-authors, and poster presentations are permitted.

Where to submit your session proposal? For the 2027 General Assembly, the PS programme spans 7 primary groups:

1. Terrestrial Planets: covers terrestrial planets, their environments, and moons. The sessions will focus on processes of the planetary interior, surface, atmosphere, exosphere and magnetosphere, studied through observation, modeling, and experimental methods.
2. Outer Planets System: focuses on the study of the complex systems associated with the giant planets and Pluto. The study includes not only planetary interiors, but also atmospheres and the interaction of magnetospheres with rings. This group is open to contributions from observational, experimental, computational, and theoretical investigations on these topics.
3. Small bodies: asteroids, comets, TNOs, meteors, and interplanetary dust: covers all minor objects in the Solar System at all heliocentric distances, including their physical properties, formation, and evolution. The group welcomes theoretical, observational, experimental, and remote-sensing contributions.
4. Space Weather and Space Weathering: covers topics related to the interaction between the solar/stellar winds or high energy particles and different objects in our heliosphere or in other solar systems, including interactions with magnetised and unmagnetised bodies, surfaces of planets, moons and asteroids, as well as comparative planetology.
5. Exoplanets and Origins and evolution of Planetary Systems: covers exoplanet detection, atmospheric and interior characterization, formation mechanisms of planetary systems, and evolution.
6. Life in the cosmos: Astrobiology and Planetary Habitability: includes studies not only on the origin, but also on the maintenance of life in the Solar System and in exoplanetary systems. This is addressed through the study of prebiotic chemistry, as well as the evolution and proliferation of primitive or complex life.
7. Planetary and Solar System exploration: Mission Support, Instruments, Observations, Applications, Analogues: covers the latest advancements and discoveries in mission support, instrumentation, observational techniques, applications, and analogues. These sessions will focus on methodologies used to study planetary bodies, moons, and other celestial objects.

EGU sessions can be multidisciplinary and are actually encouraged to be so. During the submission process you can indicate the sub-programme groups with which you would like your session to be co-organized.

Among the various opportunities, this year there are also proposal submissions for:

• Inter- and transdisciplinary sessions (ITS), designed to bridge Earth and planetary sciences studies or integrate broader social, economic, and policy disciplines.
• Geoscience & Society (GS), dedicated to education, outreach, ethics, policy, and geoscience communications.
• Short courses (SC), interactive forums focused on skill-building, training, and open software relevant to multiple Divisions.
• Geopanels (GP), high-level panels addressing current research topics, of interest to a broad range of Earth, planetary, and space sciences.

Ready to submit? Gather your colleagues and submit your session proposal(s) by the deadline, September 23. Thank you for your continued contributions to the PS Division, and we look forward to receiving your proposals! For further information and any clarifications, please refer to the official website: EGU27 – General convener guidelines and rules.

Awards and medals

You can nominate a colleague, lecturer or mentor who made a significant contribution to the geosciences or Division fields. Recommend them for one of the various prizes and medals that EGU awards each year!

Type of awards and medals

Among the most prestigious medals awarded by the EGU are: the Alfred Wegener Medal, for atmospheric, hydrological or ocean sciences; the Arthur Holmes Medal, for solid earth geosciences; the Jean Dominique Cassini Medal  for planetary and space science. These are bestowed upon scientists of exceptional international standing in the relative field of the medal. In addition, the Alexander von Humboldt Medal is awarded to scientists who have achieved outstanding research in developing regions for the benefit of people and society. These medals, along with the Union Awards granted for outstanding results in journalism, engagement and outreach, are Union-level accolades.

Each Division has also its own medal, bestowed on scientist that produce exceptional contributions to the Division field. The PS Division has the David Bates Medal and the Runcorn-Florensky Medal. EGU also wants to promote and engage early career scientists. For that reason, the union also bestows a special award upon each Division dedicated to outstanding ECSs. The EGU’s Council selects four outstanding candidates among all the Divisions and awards them the prestigious Union-level Arne Richter Award for Outstanding Early Career Scientists.

Winners of EGU medals and awards can be nominated as EGU ambassadors. In this role, they are delegated to attend meetings hosted by other organisations and to offer special presentations and lectures labelled as EGU contributions. For further information and a complete list of all the awards and medals visit the official website:  EGU – Awards & medals.

Nomination procedure

If you want to nominate your colleagues for an award or a medal please read carefully the nomination procedure. Submissions will be open next year, from 15 January to 15 June, so you still have time to prepare a compelling and convincing nomination!

Grants

EGU provides funding opportunities for training schools, as well as for conference series such as the Angioletta Coradini Conferences and Galileo conferences. The training schools are intended to provide training opportunities to young scientists, by bringing together experts on a particular topic, and financial support for the early career scientists through travel grants, field trips or lectures. The Angioletta Coradini Conference series is named in honour of an Italian astrophysicist and planetary scientist, and aimed at innovative research related to all themes of space science research. The Galileo Conferences address current topics of particular interest to the geoscience community with a 3 to 5-day meeting divided into keynote presentations, debates, and roundtable discussions. Presentations and discussions must be treated confidentially. These conferences are evaluated through a rigorous review process, and the organization is supported by professionals. The scientific program is defined by an organizing committee composed of at least one member familiar with the venue and an EGU delegate. Conference organizers are then required to publish an article on the conference topic and eventually on the conference proceedings. A financial support of up to 8000€ is provided for the participation of ECS, for web hosting, organizational support and tools.

EGU supports not only scientific research but also outreach and communication, which is why it launched, in November 2015, an annual Public Engagement Grant, that awards the 3-4 top candidates 2000€ each for funding their own outreach project. Any project is welcome: podcasts, movies, comics, experiments and many more. The only limit, apart from your imagination, is the non-commercial use of your product and the EGU membership. For more information on the grant please refer to the official website: EGU – Outreach – Public Engagement Grants.

 

We look forward to receiving your proposals, and thank you for your continued support to the Planetary & Solar System Sciences Division!

 

 

Written and edited by Gabriele Boccacci, Giulia Nejat, Janko Trisic Ponce and Salvatore Buoninfante

 

 

Icons credit: [Alphavector, Canva AI Elements Lab, Eucalyp-amethyststudio Lab, Prayogi M-Edwin M, とくめいとななし (Toku & Nana), Jenzon Lopez-Sketchify Education, Kester-sparklestroke, sketchify, Chelsea-Gonzales-Sketchify Education] via Canva.com.