UMEB: Environmental Biology in the Pacific Islands

“UMEB：太平洋岛屿的环境生物学”设在夏威夷大学马诺阿分校，将培训来自波利尼西亚和密克罗尼西亚群岛的学生从事环境生物学专业，这些岛屿在生物科学中的比例很低。UMEB实习生来自分布在热带太平洋超过16万平方英里的数千个岛屿，他们在一年级和二年级被选中，他们将有机会参加夏威夷大学马诺阿分校或查米纳德大学的环境相关培训和研究，查米纳德大学是密歇根大学校园附近的一所小型私立学院。该计划每年夏天将招收最多7名实习生，预计将有4-5名实习生继续提供全年支持。作为一个群体，学生们将参加一系列实地考察，让他们接触到几乎完好无损和严重干扰的陆地和海洋栖息地，并将与参与其中的教师以及关注环境问题的政府机构和非政府组织的代表一起参加讲座/讨论。每个学生都将加入11位导师的实验室中的一个研究小组，S将在那里获得实践研究经验。在每个实验室的导师、研究生、博士后研究员和其他本科生的指导下，每个太平洋岛屿实习生将通过学徒获得技能，并在多个层面上开展关于濒危物种保护、外来入侵物种的影响以及污染物对生命过程的影响等主题的个人研究项目。每个学生的项目将包括一个现场部分，这样参与者就会熟悉他们在自然界中研究的问题，以及工作台上的实验活动。学生将在每年的暑期结束研讨会上展示他们的研究成果；被录取参加全年计划的学生将被鼓励开发他们的项目，以便在国家科学会议上展示，并在专业期刊上发表。该计划将在4年内支持8-12名学生完成学士学位，之后学生将申请研究生院或与环境有关的工作。目前的赠款建立在UMEB之前的一个奖项的基础上，该奖项支持40名太平洋岛民进行环境研究，并为新的学生群体提供了一批榜样。这一新资助的项目将从一批优秀的实习生开始，他们在之前的UMEB奖项上得到了支持和培训。“UMEB：太平洋岛屿的环境生物学”包括一个研究机会奖(ROA)，该奖项将把来自太平洋岛屿社区学院的6名教师带到夏威夷大学，进行为期6周的关于当地环境问题的密集接触和培训，并对潜在的解决方案进行研究。通过实地考察、参观活跃的研究实验室、讲座和实际的实验室培训，学员将学习环境生物学的现代方法和在不同水平上检查遗传多样性的分子方法。他们将获得进行这类研究的现代设备，这些设备将带回本国机构，用于培训和指导学生以及进行相关研究。与太平洋岛民的学生实习生培训一起，ROA的努力将显著提高当地社区大学培训和实践健全的环境实践和补救措施的能力。这一计划将产生一群新的、有点独特的文化联系的太平洋岛民，他们接受专门培训，作为自然资源保护和恢复方面的知情领导者服务于他们的家乡岛屿。此外，它们将向世界提供有关岛屿国家在资源可持续性、保护生物多样性、珊瑚礁渔业管理、流域综合管理和控制外来物种等专题方面遇到的特殊问题的信息。由于许多目标岛屿长期以来一直依赖受过培训的科学家来填补研究、管理和政策导向的职位，环境项目经常因为缺乏短期合同人员的后续行动，以及缺乏社区的接受和参与而失败。欲了解更多信息，请联系迈克尔·G·哈德菲尔德博士(电话：808-539-7319；电子邮件：hadfield@hawai.edu)。

"UMEB: Environmental Biology in the Pacific Islands," based at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, will train students from the Polynesian and Micronesian islands, highly under-represented in the biological sciences, to pursue professions in environmental biology. Coming from thousands of islands scattered over more than 160,00 square miles of the tropical Pacific Ocean, the UMEB interns, selected during their freshman and sophomore years, will have the opportunity to participate in environmentally relevant training and research at the University of Hawaii at Manoa or Chaminade University, a small private college near the UHM campus. The program will enroll up to seven student interns each summer, with 4 - 5 expected to continue with year-round support. As a cohort, the students will participate in a series of field trips to expose them to both nearly intact and heavily disturbed terrestrial and marine habitats and will attend lectures/discussions with participating faculty and with representatives from governmental agencies and non-governmental organizations that are concerned with environmental issues. Each student will join a research group in the laboratory of one of 11 mentors where s/he will gain hands-on research experience. With guidance from mentors, graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and other undergraduates in each laboratory, each Pacific Islands intern will gain skills by apprenticeship and undertake an individual research project on a topic such as endangered species conservation, impacts of invasive alien species, and the effects of pollutants on life processes at many levels. Each student's project will include a field component, so the participants become familiar with the problem they are studying in nature, as well as bench top lab activities. Students will present their research results each year at an end-of-summer symposium; students accepted into the full year program will be encouraged to develop their projects for presentation at national scientific meetings and for publication in professional journals. Over 4 years, the program will support 8 - 12 students to the completion of bachelor's degrees after which students are expected to apply for graduate schools or environmentally relevant jobs. The present grant builds on a prior UMEB award that supported 40 Pacific Islanders in environmental research, and provided a cohort of role models for the new group of students. The newly funded program will start with an excellent group of interns who were supported and trained on the prior UMEB award."UMEB: Environmental Biology in the Pacific Islands" includes a Research Opportunity Award (ROA) that will bring six instructors from Pacific Islands community colleges to the University of Hawaii, for 6 weeks of intensive exposure and training in local environmental problems and to conduct research into potential solutions. Through field trips, visits to active research laboratories, and lectures and practical in-lab training, participants will be taught modern approaches to environmental biology and the molecular methods for examining genetic diversity at a variety of levels. They will be supplied with modern equipment for performing such studies that they will take back to their home institutions to use in training and mentoring students and carrying out relevant research. Together with student-intern training of Pacific Islanders, the ROA effort will significantly improve the capacities to of the local community colleges to train and practice sound environmental practices and remediation.This program will produce a new and somewhat unique group of culturally-connected Pacific Islanders specifically trained to serve their home islands as informed leaders in natural resource protection and restoration. Further, they will be positioned to provide information to the world on the special problems experienced in island nations relative to topics such as resource sustainability, protection of biodiversity, management of coral-reef fisheries, integrated watershed management and control of invasive species. Because many of the targeted islands have long depended on the mainland U.S. for trained scientists to fill research, management and policy-oriented positions, environmental programs have often failed due to lack of follow up from those on short term contract and because of a lack of community acceptance and involvement. For more information, contact Dr. Michael G. Hadfield (Phone: 808-539-7319; e-mail: hadfield@hawaii.edu).