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<br />5. COOPERATIVE RESEARCH <br />The Board has been an active and productive participant in <br />the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Federa1- <br />state Cooperative Program in Atmospheric Modification Research <br />(NOAA/AMP) since that program's inception in 1980. Federal funds <br />totaling approximately half a million dollars annually are pooled <br />with North Dakota's $50,000 (per biennium) cost-share to conduct <br />basic research into cloud and precipitation processes relevant to <br />cloud seeding on the northern Great Plains. Since 1984, the North <br />Dakota research has been designed to assess the transport, <br />dispersion, and flow processes within developing thunderstorms. <br />Precipitation development processes have also been of interest. <br />Field work in this regard peaked at the beginning of the <br />biennium, as the North Dakota Thunderstorm Project (NDTP) was <br />conducted in central North Dakota. That program saw some 140 <br />scientists, technicians, and students converge on central North <br />Dakota in an intensive, six-week study of thunderstorms and storm <br />development. In all, a dozen universities and fifteen federal, <br />state, and local agencies cooperated in the study. Foreign <br />participants and visitors were present from Greece, Morocco, South <br />Africa, Great Britain, and Canada. Though opportunities to study <br />hailstorms were limited, the overall field effort was very <br />successful. Resulting scientific conference presentations and <br />technical papers are listed in the following section. Analyses of <br />the collected data continued through the balance of the biennium. <br />Progress was made in several areas, for example the research <br />has demonstrated that cloud seeding material released by aircraft <br />in updrafts below growing cumulus clouds often is quickly <br />transported aloft and mixed with the "supercooled" portions of the <br />-23- <br />