Preface

The Great Lakes of the World (GLOW) Working Group was established by the Aquatic Ecosystem Health & Management Society (AEHMS) in 1996 and was followed by the convening of the first GLOW symposium in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe during the summer of that year. The success of that first conference resulted in the AEHMS launching a continuing series of GLOW symposia to promote interaction and communication amongst great lakes and large lakes researchers from all parts of the planet. The GLOW symposia were designed to establish a global platform where ecosystem-based studies dealing with the structure, function, and performance of large lake ecosystems are promoted, organized and synthesized. In addition, GLOW encourages ecosystemic science-based management of these extensive natural resources in an integrated, multi-trophic and multi-disciplinary fashion. GLOW activities are globally known, not just from the symposia, but also, and perhaps even more importantly, from the resulting peer-reviewed publications. These publications...