Planning Workshop: Increasing Capacity for Data-intensive Research in Environmental Biology

摘要环境生物学研究和教育中的许多重要问题将通过利用联邦资助的研究产生的数据财富来解决。大数据的兴起和数据密集型研究工具的快速发展共同为新发现提供了前所未有的潜力。数据密集型方法有可能彻底改变科学过程和发现，提供远远超出之前想象的规模的工作能力-利用从微环境到大陆尺度的传感器产生的数据，并综合从社会科学到物理科学的各种历史和当代数据。实现这一潜力关键取决于更广泛地获取和采用数据密集型研究方法，而这些方法在环境生物学教育和研究中仍然相对少见。环境生物学领域一直受到获取和使用大数据档案的技能和工具的阻碍。目前，环境科学课程并没有始终如一地教授数据管理、编程和其他计算基础方面的基本技能；这些技能和知识是有效从事数据密集型研究所必需的。该研讨会旨在探索环境生物学领域的前进方向，以广泛提高数据密集型科学所需的技能。将编写一份包括一套具体建议的讲习班报告，预计讲习班将动员一个志同道合的数据密集型研究培训倡导者网络，以提高认识，并协作领导未来的活动，提高环境生物学工作人员的计算素养水平。拟议的研讨会参与者是参与这些努力的开拓者，也是环境生物学研究和教育的领导者。讲习班将促进集体行动和协调未来的方法，这将有助于改变环境生物学中数据密集型研究方法的接触和使用。

AbstractMany important questions in environmental biology research and education will be addressed by harnessing the wealth of data generated through federally funded research. The rise of big data and rapid development of data-intensive research tools together present unprecedented potential for new discovery. Data-intensive approaches hold the potential to revolutionize scientific process and discovery, offering the ability to work far beyond scales previously imagined - leveraging data produced by sensors from micro-environments to continental scales, and synthesizing across historical and contemporary data that span a diversity from the social to the physical sciences. Achieving this potential depends critically on broader access to and adoption of data-intensive research approaches that remain relatively uncommon in environmental biology education and research. The field of environmental biology has been hampered by the skills and tools to access and use the big data archives. Currently foundational skills in data management, programming, and other computing fundamentals are not consistently taught in environmental sciences curricula; such skills and knowledge are requisite for effectively engaging in data-intensive research. This workshop is designed to explore a way forward for the field of environmental biology to broadly improve skills necessary for data-intensive science. A workshop report including a concrete set of recommendations will be produced and it is anticipated that the workshop will mobilize a network of like-minded advocates for data-intensive research training to raise awareness, and collaboratively lead future activities that raise the level of computing literacy in the environmental biology workforce. The proposed workshop participants are trailblazers involved in these efforts, as well as leaders in environmental biology research and education. The workshop will facilitate collective action and coordinated future approaches that will help to transform exposure to and employment of data-intensive research approaches in environmental biology.