Conference Comments by the Editors

The Symposium on Radiation Measurements and Applications (SORMA) met for the first time on the West Coast June 2-5, 2008, in Berkeley, CA. With radiation detectors increasing in number, variety, and societal importance, we plan to alternate between SORMA East (in Ann Arbor, MI) and SORMA West so that the forum will be available every two years. The topic areas for SORMA West 2008 were much the same as those of recent Ann Arbor programs, and were meant to encompass the full breadth of ionizing radiation measurement applications and technologies, with both oral and poster presentations. The technical program of SORMA 2008 included 342 scientific presentations, 116 oral presentations plus eight invited keynote lectures in plenary sessions, as well as 218 presentations in poster sessions. The SORMA 2008 meetings were attended by 439 registered participants from 25 different countries. Topics of interest at the meeting ranged from room temperature semiconductor detectors, cryogenic detectors, photodetectors, neutron detectors, novel scintillators, nonproportionality and characterization of scintillators, simulation and analysis of radiation interactions, novel radiation sources, imaging technologies and homeland security and medical applications. This was the first conference of the SORMA series to be technically cosponsored by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), specifically by the Nuclear and Plasma Sciences Society (NPSS) of IEEE. The co-sponsorship has been important for visibility of SORMA and for attracting a record number of new participants. This special issue of IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE comprises the refereed proceedings of SORMA 2008, containing 128 papers on the research presentations. The Chairs of the SORMA 2008 conference would like to acknowledge partial financial support from the NNSA, DNDO, and DTRA, and organizational support from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. We acknowledge our corporate supporters: Caen Nuclear, Eljen Technology, Hilger Crystals and GE Global Research. Finally, we thank the members of the local organizing committee: Diana Attila, Thomas Budinger, Joe Chew, Daniel Chivers, Rob Johnson, Laurie O'Brien, Donna Raziano, Emily Sause, and Brian Wirth for doing all the work that actually made this conference happen.