6th Annual Land Data Assimilation Community Virtual Workshop
27 – 28 October, 2026 Online
Technical challenges are the focus of this annual meeting as the scientific questions that lie behind those technical developments are typically the focus of other professional meetings and conferences.
The workshop brings together land DA scientists to highlight a range of data assimillation methods used across the community, discuss challenges facing different modeling communities, and identify strategies for addressing those challenges.
We welcome participation from researchers working across a broad range of land surface states and fluxes (carbon, energy, water, crops, fire, and land management), timescales (daily to millennial), and applications (weather prediction, agricultural forecasting, carbon-climate feedbacks, and climate change impacts).
This workshop fosters knowledge exchange, promotes the routine use of DA tools in a wider modeling community, and strengthens connections among land DA researchers. We seek to build a collaborative community that is inclusive of all backgrounds and career stages.
Daily Sessions
To accomodate participation across multiple time zones, each workshop day will include two live sessions:
- 10:00 AM–1:00 PM China Standard Time (CST)
- 10:00 AM–1:00 PM Eastern Daylight Time (EDT)
Participants are welcome to attend the session that best fits their schedule. Please note that exact timings are subject to change as the agenda is finalized.
Call for Abstracts and Community Input
We are currently accepting abstract submissions for oral and poster presentations that address technical challenges and advances in land data assimilation system development and implementation. This is an excellent opportunity to share your work, connect with colleagues across the community, and contribute to the advancement of the field.
One focus of this year’s workshop will be strengthening engagement with the Earth observation community. Effective land data assimilation depends not only on advances in algorithms and models, but also on a clear understanding of the characteristics, uncertainties, and complementarities of available observations. We encourage presentations and discussions that explore the benefits and trade-offs of different observational datasets and their implications for land DA system development.
In addition to research presentations, we welcome community input to help shape the workshop agenda. We are particularly interested in hearing what topics participants would find most valuable for discussion, including ideas for collaborative activities, focused discussion sessions, and areas where additional knowledge sharing would benefit the community.
Researchers across all career stages and areas of land data assimilation are encouraged to submit abstracts and participate.
Submit an Abstract:
Invited Speakers
-
Katherine Deck (California Institute of Technology, Caltech)
- Alexander Gruber (Technische Universität Wien)
- Harrie-Jan Hendricks Franssen (Forschungszentrum Jülich)
- Ewan Pinnington (European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, ECMWF)
- Haodi Xu (Cornell University)
Learn More
Learn more about the Land DA Community here: https://land-da-community.github.io.
Important Dates
June 22: Open call for abstracts
September 4: Abstract submission deadline
September 18: Acceptance notifications
October 1: Preliminary program release/registration reminder
October 27-29: Workshop dates