Climate research increasingly demands international collaborations in both climate monitoring and modeling. Both China and United Kingdom (UK) realize each other’s potential in future climate science development. To encourage the future collaboration, Dr. Chris Gordon, head of Science Partnerships of UK Met Office, invited scientists of Institute of Atmospheric Physics (IAP), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) to visit Met Office and explore some potential cooperation opportunities. During 28-29th January, 2013, CAS-IAP delegation, led by director Huijun Wang and deputy director Jiang Zhu, has visited UK Met Office and attended the workshop on “UK-China Joint Challenges in Climate Science”. The workshop is funded by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s Global Partnership Fund. The purpose of the workshop is to increase research links between UK and China in climate change through joint research program. On China side, the CAS-IAP is the leading partner and nine scientists attend the workshop; In the UK, it is the Met Office and Academic Partners (Universities of Leeds, Reading and Exeter) and more scientists attend the workshop. Besides, Dr. Net Garnett from National Environment Research Council (NERC), Dr. Chris Sear from the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and Ms. Ming Liu, deputy-head China Science and Innovation Network in British Consulate-General Guangzhou have attended the workshop.

The opening ceremony of the workshop has been convened in the Met Office and chaired by Dr. Chris Gordon. Director Huijun Wang of IAP/CAS has conducted a lecture on “Climate Research at IAP” which covers CAS-IAP’s historical development overview, organization of academics, research teams, instruments and equipments, postgraduate education, domestic and foreign communication as well as major advances in climate research, climate simulation and prediction for the past few years. Prof. Stephen Belcher, head of Met Office Hadley Centre has made a brief introduction of Met Office climate research situation, especially its progress in climate system model and operational system of short-term climate prediction.

Subsequently, representatives went to the Dartington Hall to participate in a shared one-day plenary session organized by “Uk-China Joint Challenges in Climate Science” workshop and “Understanding and Presenting Atmospheric Convection across Scales” international symposium. In the session, Prof. Tianjun Zhou of IAP gave a presentation on “Challenges of East Asian summer monsoon modeling” and Prof. Zhongwei Yan of IAP made a talk on “Global and regional drying trend during the latter half of the 20th century”. Furthermore, Prof. Tianjun Zhou presided over three reports on the topic of “Improving the prediction of floods and droughts”.

In the afternoon of Jan. 29th, director Huijun Wang of CAS-IAP and Prof. Riyu Lu of CAS-IAP respectively introduced the research achievements of “Anthrupogengic effect on East Asian monsoon interdecadal shift” and “Predictability of inerannual variability in western North Pacific summer climate” while Prof. Zhongwei Yan of IAP presented his research about “Warming effect of urbanization in China”. After the workshop, CAS-IAP made a discussion with Met Office about future cooperation methods and cooperation fields, they have also reached an agreement on the development of scientific research, exchange of visiting scholars and information. Based on the discussion, UK Met Office and CAS-IAP have identified several proper areas of mutual interests and feasibility for joint research projects in order to maximize the benefits from each other’s expertise and resources in developing climate science. The focus of joint research is on high resolution modeling and decadal climate attribution and prediction. Furthermore, director Huijun Wang and Dr. Chris Gorden have signed “the Memorandum of Agreement between the Institute of Atmospheric Physics and United Kingdom Met Office”. The target of the agreement is to establish a platform for future collaboration and come up with some joint research proposals.

CAS-IAP has a long academic communication history with related research units in UK, however, it is the first time that the visit is in the name of CAS-IAP and led by the director of CAS-IAP personally. The workshop has been highly appreciated by Dr. Net Garnett, Dr. Chris Sear and Ms. Ming Liu, they fully anticipated an efficient scientific cooperation can be developed between CAS-IAP and Met Office in the coming years. According to the visit, both sides have a comprehensive recognition of each other’s scientific research, academic exchange, organizational management, etc, which has laid the foundation for a fresh collaborative areas.