Short Term Scientific Missions were judged to be an essential part of the Action, indeed these were most attractive to the members as they allowed research programme to be developed and new collaborations to be initiated. A first call for proposals was issued in January 2004 and several responses received. Unfortunately changes in staff at the COST office slowed the administration of such awards and many were not processed until later in the year.

At the Lyons meeting the New COST Adminstrator, Ms S Beauloye, attended the meeting and reported the new arrangements for STSMs encouraging applications. The Action proved to be extremely popular and engendered many STSM applications (over 60 in all) before the COST office in March 2005 announced that no more STSM’s could be hosted in 2005. A full list of the 75 STSM’s held in 2004 and 2005 can be found by clicking on the relevant year. Several of these visits have led to further collaborations and publications are now forthcoming (and are posted on the website as soon as they are made known to the webmaster and MC).