Standard Grant: An Ethnography of Pathways to Interdisciplinary Knowledge Integration at Two Environmental Science Sites in Brazil

一般观众摘要 该项目旨在利用科学和技术研究（STS）的工具，以加强跨规模，学科和国际边界的科学合作的经验理解。研究人员将参与两个国际科学项目的人种学调查，以整合巴西亚马逊地区的微生物知识，这是一个全球生物多样性水库和国际科学伙伴关系的前沿。她将研究科学家的协作实践，使用定性和可视化方法来完成她的研究目标，即确定更有效的知识整合的具体途径，并推进对跨学科科学和国际合作的本体论和地缘政治层面的理论理解。该项目将通过确定跨学科和国际科学的最佳做法产生社会效益。它还将通过人文调查，特别是艺术和视觉媒体，提高公众对分子和微生物环境科学新趋势的理解。该项目的预期成果包括：对两名学生进行STS理论和方法方面的指导和培训;针对公共资助机构和科学从业人员的白色论文;在影响力大的期刊上发表若干文章;以及为期三个月的博物馆参观，并开发相关网站和教材。传播计划包括在两次国际会议上作介绍，与来自巴西和加拿大的学生和合作者共同撰写出版物，以及开发一个英文和葡萄牙文的项目网站。技术总结 亚马逊环境科学的民族志研究将确定更有效的知识整合的途径，并将推进STS关于跨学科科学和国际合作的本体论和地缘政治层面的理论。它将在三个方面取得重要的知识进步：（1）关于有效知识整合的新经验知识，包括跨尺度，学科和文化合作的障碍和最佳实践;（2）新颖的研究方法，直观地解释学科文化如何在多尺度上构建和整合调查对象的方法中出现分歧;（3）将科学理论作为视觉实践加以改进，其基础是个体主体如何体验，甚至如何通过不同缩放模型和实践之间的相遇而改变。该项目以巴西亚马逊为重点，将对该地区的知识生产产生有用的经验性见解，该地区的科学探索，专业知识和知识提取几十年来一直陷入政治争议。开展研究，加强对影响为应对环境变化而合作产生知识的各种因素的系统了解，是一个公认的优先事项。

General Audience Summary This project aims to use the tools of science and technology studies (STS) to enhance empirical understanding of scientific collaboration across scales, disciplines, and international borders. The investigator will engage in an ethnographic inquiry of two international science projects seeking to integrate knowledge about microbes in the Brazilian Amazon, a global reservoir of biodiversity and frontier for international science partnerships. She will examine the collaborative practices of scientists using qualitative and visual methods to complete her research objectives, which are to identify concrete pathways to more effective knowledge integration and to advance theoretical understanding of the ontological and geopolitical dimensions of interdisciplinary science and international collaboration. The project will generate societal benefits by identifying best practices in interdisciplinary and international science. It will also enhance public understanding of new trends in molecular and microbial environmental science through humanistic inquiry, specifically art and visual medium. Expected outcomes of the project include the mentoring and training of two students in STS theory and methods; a white paper aimed at public funding agencies and science practitioners; several publications in high-impact journals; and a three-month museum visit with development of an associated website and educational materials. Dissemination plans include presentations at two international conferences, co-authored publications with students and collaborators from Brazil and Canada, and the development of a project website in English and Portuguese. Technical Summary This ethnographic study of environmental science in the Amazon will identify pathways to more effective knowledge integration and will advance theories in STS regarding the ontological and geopolitical dimensions of interdisciplinary science and international collaboration. It will make important intellectual advances on three fronts: (1) New empirical knowledge regarding effective knowledge integration, including the barriers and best practices in collaboration across scales, disciplines, and cultures; (2) Novel research methods that visually explain how disciplinary cultures diverge in their approaches to framing and integrating objects of inquiry at multiple scales; and (3) Improved theories of science as visual practice, grounded in how individual subjects experience and are even transformed by encounters between differing scaling imaginaries and practices. With a focus on the Brazilian Amazon, the project will produce useful empirical insights about knowledge production in a region where scientific exploration, expertise, and knowledge extraction has been mired in political controversy for decades. Research that enhances systematic understanding of factors affecting collaborative knowledge production in response to environmental change is a recognized priority.