CALL FOR ABSTRACTS
Deadlines May 29 - Oral and Poster Abstracts
A call for art submissions will be announced soon.
Attendees The conference is a forum connecting the broad community of scientists, engineers, resource managers, and community members working on Bay-Delta issues.
Format The Conference will include a plenary session, concurrent oral sessions, poster session, interspersed art (visual, audio, spoken) and storytelling interludes, and art-science collaboration exhibits. We highly encourage submitting session proposals that use an alternative format that facilitates dialogue and discussion, engages the audience, considers multi-generational perspectives, or integrates art and humanities to embody the theme of “building and being the future.” Contributed oral abstracts will be organized into sessions based on topic. Organized sessions can also be proposed by submitting an abstract for a special oral session or poster cluster.
Click here to visit Oral Sessions page
Click here to visit Poster Sessions page
Fee Honoraria and other reimbursements are not available. All presenters (oral, poster, and art) and session moderators will be required to register at the applicable registration rate. Any fees required to set up or ship materials are the responsibility of the presenter.
PRESENTATION TOPICS
This year’s theme calls on communities, knowledge holders, scientists, practitioners, leaders, and others invested in the Bay-Delta to recognize this moment of change and work together to shape the future. As you prepare an abstract, we invite you to consider how your proposed session or presentation aligns with the following themes. Across all themes, we especially encourage presentations that use creative approaches to deepen understanding and connection, such as featuring collaborations between art and science, storytelling for policy and public engagement, and effective communication of uncertainty, risk, and change.
This list is not exhaustive, and we encourage traditional and non-traditional science, as well as creativity and diversity. We also encourage talks about science that extends beyond the Bay-Delta, including those that compare Bay-Delta systems and processes to those in other areas of the globe or that include research or knowledge about the Bay-Delta ecosystem’s upper watershed.
Interdisciplinary Science and Cross-Knowledge Integration Moving beyond silos and disciplinary boundaries toward truly integrated science with a focus on cross-sector collaboration and multiple ways of knowing. Research that values Traditional Ecological Knowledge and community-based monitoring to promote co-production of knowledge and collaborative learning networks.
Nature-Based Solutions and Landscape Resilience Designing with nature to achieve multi-benefit outcomes. Work that highlights floodplain and wetland restoration, innovative climate adaptation infrastructure, and resulting ecosystem and human co-benefits.
Systems Thinking for the Whole Ecosystem Understanding and designing for system-wide outcomes that benefit natural ecosystems and human communities. Exploring sustainable coexistence under climate change, while realizing tradeoffs across ecological, social, and economic goals and prioritizing environmental justice and access to ecosystem benefits.
Invasive Species and Novel Ecosystems Addressing the realities of irreversible ecological change, including ecosystem function and impacts on human communities in invaded systems. Focus on prevention, the tradeoffs of control, and adaptation strategies for management.
Ecology, Food Webs, and Changing Ecosystems Advancing understanding of key species and ecosystem dynamics under stress. Research focused on key focal species, environmental condition shifts, food web restructuring, and monitoring and interpreting ecological change.
Decision Science and Adaptive Mindsets in a Dynamic System Exploring decision-making frameworks, scenario analysis, learning-oriented management, and tradeoff evaluation. Models and examples of managing uncertainty and transformation.
Managing Competing Demands for Water Linking science and management to balance water supply and ecosystem needs. Collaboration, forecasting, and modeling that improves understanding of physical processes such as hydrodynamics, sediment transport, and geomorphology.
Water Quality, Contaminants, and Aquatic Health Finding ways to manage effects of water quality on aquatic species and human communities. Studies on nutrients, contaminants, HABs, biogeochemical processes, and public health and ecosystem impacts.
Finding Collaborative Solutions Recognizing that restoration and management outcomes depend on mutual collaboration, not just analysis. Examples of conflict resolution and consensus-building, multi-party negotiations, and science in support of management.
PROPOSAL SUBMISSIONS / ABSTRACT COLLECTION
There is a 300-word limit on the abstract text. Please fill in all the blanks on the form, including selection of the appropriate theme or special session, any special projection equipment needs, and your preference for an oral or poster presentation.
Depending on the number and content of abstracts submitted, the Program Team may move some of the requested oral presentations into the poster session.Incomplete or poorly written abstracts and those that are not relevant to Bay-Delta issues will not be accepted.
A complete abstract should include the following components.
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Objectives Statement: What is your work designed to achieve or illuminate, and why?
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Approach: How did you go about solving or making progress on the problem?
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Results: What are your main findings?
Management and Policy Relevance and / or Opportunity
All submissions must provide a short statement (150 words or
less) that speaks to the applied, management and/or policy
relevance. Management relevant science is the application of
knowledge gained from interdisciplinary research and
monitoring that informs and guides planning and management
decisions for a particular set of issues. Policy-relevant science
is the application of knowledge gained from interdisciplinary
research and monitoring that informs and guides policies. These
approaches allow for decisions based on reliable evidence, helping
to balance ecosystem services and human needs.
To address this, we invite you to consider these questions:
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What are the implications of your findings in terms of the ways we engage with and steward our natural systems, associated resources, and human processes and uses?
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What insights do your findings provide towards ecosystem sustainability in the near and long-term futures?
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Are there other key efforts or findings that your work is or could be synergistic with? If so, what are those and what form might that synergy take?
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If we were to re-operate our system, where applicable, to fully integrate and orient around your findings, what might that look like?
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How does (or could) your work help communicate findings or knowledge to support decision-making?
Proposal Schedule
Submission deadline – 11:59 pm PST, May 29, 2026
Presenters notified – July 10, 2026
All abstracts for oral sessions (special and general) and posters (including clusters) are due 11:59 pm PST, May 29, 2026.
Information on the Delta Science Program is available at www.deltacouncil.ca.gov/science-program
Other Relevant Information
Talk and poster submissions may consider integrating multiple and alternative perspectives while still presenting cogent technical material through narrative. As the Planning Team evaluates proposals, we will consider the degree to which submissions draw attention to multiple ways of integrating or interpreting data, the use of alternative methods and approaches to arrive at study conclusions, and the identification of cases where multiple viewpoints, perspectives, or stakeholder input has resulted in more robust, resilient, or defensible science. We will feature inclusivity and breadth in our science community where possible when selecting conference presentations.
In addition to general sessions and poster topics, which will be based on the abstracts received, conference participants may propose special oral sessions or poster clusters on topics of particular importance to the Bay-Delta, especially topics that address diversity.
Delta Science Tracker
In advance of the conference, we encourage you to contribute information
about your science activities to the Delta Science Tracker (Science Tracker)
for the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The abstract submission form provides
an opportunity to share the link(s) to projects in the Science Tracker that are
relevant to your presentation. This will allow all attendees to find out more
information about your project leading up to or after the conference.
Using the Science Tracker contributes to a shared commitment to building collective scientific knowledge and informing management of the Delta. We expect that you will continue to benefit by using the Science Tracker as
you expand your network, form new collaborations, and create new science activities.
We invite you to explore and share the resources below/attached to familiarize yourself with the SAA and Science Tracker.
Read the 2022-2026 SAA
Explore the Delta Science Tracker
Read the Researcher’s Guide to Funding and Tracking Priority Science
For questions or additional information, please contact SAA@deltacouncil.ca.gov or sciencetracker@deltacouncil.ca.gov.