The PEEX hybrid (online/ onsite) seminar took place on 22 April 2025 (Sofia Cultural Center, Vuosaari, Helsinki, Finland). This event was organised as a part of the 4th ACCC (The Atmosphere and Climate Competence Center; https://www.acccflagship.fi) Impact Week (22-25 Apr 2025; see detailed agenda at https://www.acccflagship.fi/index.php/4th-accc-impact-week-2025), and hosted by the University of Helsinki (UH). More than 50 participants attended the PEEX hybrid meeting, with majority of participants attending online. The participants were from more than 35 different Universities, research institutes/ organizations and companies from Armenia, China, Denmark, Iceland, Italy, Finland, France, Germany, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Turkey, and Ukraine. The main aims of this meeting were: (i) to introduce the research and educational activities at new PEEX partner universities, and (ii) to discuss future collaboration in a frame of climate change and air quality research.

The PEEX seminar opened with welcome words (by Acad. Prof. Markku Kulmala, UH) and an introductory talk on PEEX programme overview (by Dr. Hanna K. Lappalainen, UH). New members (Universities and Research Institutes) of the PEEX community delivered oral talks about general overviews, research and educational activities in their organizations. In particular, these talks were delivered by members of the Agricultural University of Iceland (AUI, Iceland), Odessa Polytechnic National University (OP, Ukraine), Ukrainian Joint Meteorological and Hydrological Society (UJMHS, Ukraine),  Istanbul Technical University (ITU, Turkey),  ARIANET srl. (Italy),  Dalian University of Technology (DUT, China), Institute of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences (ISOS), Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences (DAOS) and Integrated Research on Disaster Risks International Center of Excellence (IRDS-ICCoE) at Fudan University (FDU, China).

Several presentations about upcoming funded projects, proposals in evaluation and preparation were presented by colleagues from the UH, University of Latvia (UL, Latvia), and University of Copenhagen (UCPH, Denmark). In particular, the presentation delivered by UL introduced recently funded by the Interreg programme the REOPEN project “Next Generation Workforce – Empowering Young People for Improved Employment” (6 partners from 3 countries (with funding of 1.2 MEu for a 2.5-year period). The presentation about the COST Action PEEX-EU-NEN-ReN “Pan-Eurasian EXperiment – Europe – Near Europe Neighbourhood countries Earth System Research Network” proposal was presented by UH. It is currently under evaluation (results are expected in Apr-Mary 2025). It includes 31 partners/ organizations in the consortium from 17 countries (with funding of 0.6 MEu for a 4-year period). The presentation delivered by UCPH introduced steps in preparation of proposal for the “PEEX implementation plan for Shanghai MegaCity and Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration”. In addition, the presentation “CLUVEX concept, training of moderators and students as Climate Messengers” by UH focused on the ongoing educational Erasmus+ CLUVEX project (https://www.atm.helsinki.fi/cluvex) and in particular, sharing information with participants about the Call for the CLUVEX 2^nd Virtual Exchange Week for Students (12-16 May 2025) (https://www.atm.helsinki.fi/cluvex/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/2nd_Call-VEWeek-for-students_Spring_2025.pdf).

See agenda of the PEEX hybrid seminar.

See list of participants of the PEEX hybrid seminar.

Text by: Hanna K. Lappalainen, Markku Kulmala, Alexander Mahura (INAR – Univ Helsinki)