Studying the hydrological cycle in the Mediterranean

Fourth Hydrological Cycle in Mediterranean Experiment Workshop; Bologna, Italy, 8-10 June 2010; Studying the hydrological cycle in the Mediterranean involves researching issues relating to floods and water scarcity, its response to climate change, and the sensitivity of the environment and societies to hydrologic variability. The development of a coordinated program for studying the hydrological cycle in the Mediterranean region was the focus of the fourth international Hydrological Cycle in Mediterranean Experiment (HyMeX; http://www.hymex.org) workshop, organized by a committee chaired by Silvio Davolio of the Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate of the Italian National Research Council. The HyMeX program has two main objectives: (1) to improve understanding of the water cycle, with emphasis on extreme events, by monitoring and modeling the Mediterranean coupled system (atmosphere-land-ocean) and its variability (from the event scale to seasonal and interannual scales) and characteristics over 1 decade in the context of global change; and (2) to evaluate societal and economic vulnerability to extreme events and adaptation capacity.