President’s Message/Message du Président Spring / Printemps 2018 11 The journal Radio Science, sponsored by URSI and published by the American Geo- physical Union, contains original research articles on all aspects of electromagnetic phenomena including propagation through, and the interaction of electromagnetic waves with, geophysical media, biological media, plasmas, and man-made structures. URSI has held a general assembly every three years since 1922. The 32nd URSI Gen- eral Assembly and Scientific Symposium (URSI GASS) was held in Montreal from 19-26 August 2017. The next URSI GASS will be held in Rome in 2020. In recent years, URSI has begun to organize two other conferences that take place be- tween General Assemblies. The 2018 URSI Atlantic Radio Science Meeting, AT-RASC, will be held in Gran Canaria, Spain from 28 May – 1 June 2018. The 2019 URSI Asia- Pacific Radio Science Conference will be Like other international scientific unions, URSI pursues its mission by sponsoring publications, hosting conferences, and or- ganizing working groups. The Radio Science Bulletin (published quar- terly in March, June, September and De- cember) contains scientific articles covering the fields of interest of the ten scientific commissions of URSI. Emphasis is placed on non-specialized contributions that are oriented towards the entire radio science community. There is a very high level of activity in Canada within the remit of Commission J. The largest-ever radio telescope built by Canadian universities, CHIME (Canadian Hydrogen In- tensity Mapping Experiment), has been completed and has begun initial science oper- ations on the high-frequency side of band, attempting to detect the signature of atomic hydrogen at cosmological distances around a redshift of z ~ 0.4. CHIME uses innovative FPGA and GPU-based back end systems to han- dle the multi-terabits per second data rates. At (sub)millimetre wavelengths, the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile is currently in its fifth full year of science operations, with Canadian participation in science user support, science operations, and in the technical maintenance of its W-band receiver suite. ALMA is argu- ably the astronomy facility having the most scientific impact at the present time. A Canadian astronomer, Sean Dougherty, has just become the inter- national ALMA Director. Canada is also a partner in the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) development program, with NRC leading the mid-frequency Central Signal Processor project and con- tributing to front end development for both the SKA and its precursor MeerKAT array in South Africa. The Dunlap Institute has been awarded a major grant to develop a radio astronomy data centre to serve both the Very Large Array (VLA) Sky Survey under way in the United States and the future needs of Canadian SKA users. Canada is also a major partner in the definition phase of the proposed next-generation VLA ar- ray proposed to be built in the Amer- ican southwest: Canadian astronomers are playing prominent roles in the definition of the science case for the array and NRC is working on high-frequency front ends as well as developing a proposed antenna design based on its unique composite ma- terials antenna technology. Like other inter- national scientific unions, URSI pursues its mission by spon- soring publications, hosting conferences, and organizing working groups. The largest-ever radio telescope built by Canadian universities, CHIME (Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (Continued on page 12) Photo: Andre Renard/Dunlap Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics Photo: ESO/C. Malin