International Union for Quaternary Research Congress

May 2011

For the last eight years Professor Pete Coxon has been the Secretary-General of the International Union for Quaternary Research (INQUA). The most important part of INQUA’s remit is the work of it’s Commissions that co-ordinate and fund research in key areas of Quaternary Science on an international basis.
Since 1928, INQUA has held a Congress (more or less) every 4 years (e.g. Berlin 1995, Durban 1999, Reno 2003 and Cairns 2007) attracting large numbers of Quaternary researchers. This year the XVIII INQUA Congress is to be held in Bern, Switzerland, and Pete was invited to Chair the Scientific Programme Committee. This role has involved frequent visits to Bern and the subsequent organisation of over 2,900 abstracts into 110 scientific sessions (oral and poster) for a 7 day Congress. The finalised programme, the schedules and the sessions titles are all now available at http://www.inqua2011.ch/ where the scale of the meeting can be appreciated.