Town and Country Hotel and Convention Center
San Diego, California
November 4-10, 2001

The IEEE Nuclear Science Symposium (NSS) and Medical Imagining Conference (MIC) was held last year and included the Symposium on Nuclear Power Systems (SNPS) as well as the 12^th International Workshop on Room Temperature Semiconductor X- and Gamma-Ray Detectors (RTSD).

The RTSD Program was a trial effort to determine the suitability of co-locating this activity with the NSS/MIC conference and turned out to be a great success. The attendees from each conference segment benefited from the high synergism of their respective programs.  It appears that there is enthusiastic support to continue this practice for future conferences.

The call for papers produced more than 750 high quality submissions and resulted in an expansion of every program, in both oral and poster sessions.  The high number of submissions helped to facilitate one of the highest attendance records in many years. Total attendance was over 1000, with record numbers also engaging in Short Course and Companion Program activities. This participation was a startling, yet pleasant, surprise  in light of the recent preceding events of September 11.  A special thanks, once again, to those of you who came and contributed at the conference, especially to those who had to endure travel hardships to be with us.

The SNPS sessions were expanded to three full sessions of excellent oral presentations. This is an area in which we expect to continue to attract more interest, as the nuclear power industry appears to be on a path of increased interest.

With respect to Short Courses, an extra effort was made to expand the offerings to address emerging areas of interest. The Continuing Education Program consisted of nine short courses in nuclear science and medical imaging, providing comprehensive coverage of the topics of interest.

The Town & Country Convention center proved to be an excellent location, providing all of the resources necessary for successful exhibition and conference.  This year’s conference reception was held in the hotel pool area with a full buffet emphasizing Mexican cuisine with elaborate desert offerings.  Entertainment for the reception was provided by an outstanding mariachi band.

The Exhibits Program was quite successful and extremely well attended. The Exhibitor Sessions, a continuation of a new initiative from last year’s conference in Lyon, were full of excellent presentations detailing exciting new developments from the commercial sector.  At the opening of the exhibition, we had what appeared to be a standing room only exhibits reception that garnered the attention of most attendees at the conference.

This year, we chose to pursue an all electronic presentation methodology for oral sessions.  To the first order, this effort was very successful, though, because all of the computers were networked together, we found that we were particularly vulnerable to computer viruses.  With minor achitectural changes, electronic presentations will be the standard method for future NSS/MIC conferences.

Overall the conference was an enormous success.  I especially want to thank the following folks for their support and tireless efforts contributing to this success.

• Ann Tyler – Coordinator
• Graham Smith, Bo Yu – NSS Program
• BenTsui, Eric Frey – MIC Program
• Jay Forster – SNPS Program
• Ralph James, Paul Siffert – RTSD Program
• Judy Sanders, Christina Sanders, Malica Tareb – Registration
• Gary Alley, Lynette Willard, Nancy Salmon – Short Course Program
• Lynn Bergman, Lee Lampo, Frieda Forster – Companion Program
• Guy Armantrout – Treasurer
• Uwe Bratzler – Promotion
• Ed Lampo, Joe Mauger, Guillaume Mauger – Local Arrangements
• Tony Seibert, Brad Sleaford, Joel Surget, Michele Ulma – Guest Editor
• Alen Friensehner – Photographer
• Jan Grimm, Mag Simmons, Lei Loni Rodrigues – Administration
• Shaun Lund   Graphic Arts
• Tony Maeda, Larry Brinkley, Dora Merelli – Computer Support

Anthony Lavietes, the 2001 NSS-MIC General Chairman, prepared this wrap-up of the very successful meeting he chaired. He can be reached at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, 7000 East Avenue, L-153 Livermore, California 94550; Phone: +1 925 423-6766; Fax: +1 925 422-1332; E-mail: lavietes1@llnl.gov