Minnesota Partnership to Foster Native American Participation in Astrophysics

明尼苏达大学莫里斯分校(UMM)和双子城分校(UMTC)将建立一个新的天文学研究和教育伙伴关系，旨在为美国印第安人和阿拉斯加原住民(AIAN)的学生进入天体物理学领域建立一条坚实的途径。该计划将交织在UMM和UMTC校区的课程和研究优势。多信使天体物理学(MMA)的一系列前沿研究项目将由Umm AIAN的学生在UMM和UMTC的指导下进行。这些项目将是数据密集型的，利用UMTC天体物理学教员获得最现代天体物理数据集和计算资源的机会，以及UMM教员在数据科学方面的专业知识。教师和学生都有职业发展的机会，包括研讨会和其他旨在培养沟通技能、领导力和团队合作技能、管理技能、性别和种族意识、道德和其他方面的活动。这一伙伴关系将对AIAN少数人参与天体物理学产生深远的积极影响，并提供一个可以在其他计划和学科中复制的成功模板。过去十年见证了天体物理学的显著进步，包括发现了黑洞和/或中子星的双星合并产生的引力波，首次观测到黑洞事件视界，以及银河系中心超大质量黑洞的成像。参与合作的学生和教职员工将参与这些领域的研究，具体项目包括使用MMA改进宇宙膨胀率的测量，使用UMTC涡轮增压仪器快速搜索天文合并事件，测量引力波和电磁辐射之间的相关性，以及更好地了解我们太阳系的空间环境。在教育方面，将在伙伴关系开始时在UMM建立一个新的天体物理学专业领域。UMM和UMTC的教职员工将参加UMM Gateway桥梁计划，该计划旨在培养AIAN学生的大学技能，并在他们开始大一之前缩小成绩差距。该项目还将利用UMM接触AIAN学生和社区的机会，开展一系列旨在向AIAN社区推广天体物理学(以及更广泛的科学)的活动。每学期将组织土著天文学讲习班，目标是UMM、UMTC和AIAN社区。其他活动将包括每学期在UMM的天体物理学日，这将包括UMTC天体物理学教员的公开讲座、技术研讨会、便携式天文馆展示，以及UMM望远镜的公共观测之夜。这一奖项推进了宇宙之窗大理想的目标。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

A new research and education partnership in astronomy will be developed between two University of Minnesota campuses, at Morris (UMM) and at the Twin Cities (UMTC), aimed at building a robust pathway for American Indian and Alaskan Native (AIAN) students to enter into the field of astrophysics. The program will interweave the courses and research strengths at both UMM and UMTC campuses. A series of frontier research projects in Multi-Messenger Astrophysics (MMA) will be pursued by UMM AIAN students, mentored by both UMM and UMTC faculty. The projects will be data-intensive, leveraging the UMTC astrophysics faculty’s access to the most modern astrophysics datasets and computing resources as well as UMM faculty’s expertise in data science. Both faculty and students will have opportunities for professional development, including workshops and other activities designed to develop communication skills, leadership and teamwork skills, management skills, gender and racial awareness, ethics, and others. This partnership will have a profound positive impact on the participation of the AIAN minority in astrophysics, as well as providing a successful template that could be replicated in other programs and disciplines.The past decade has witnessed remarkable advances in astrophysics, including the discovery of gravitational waves generated in mergers of binary systems of black holes and/or neutron stars, the first observations of the black hole event horizon, and the imaging of the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way. Students and faculty participating in the partnership will take part in research in these areas, with specific projects proposed to use MMA to refine the measurement of the expansion rate of the universe, to carry out rapid searches for astronomical merger events using the UMTC TURBO instrument, to measure correlations between gravitational waves and electromagnetic radiation, and to better understand the space environment in our solar system. In education, a new Astrophysics Area of Concentration at UMM will be established at the beginning of the partnership. UMM and UMTC faculty will take part in the UMM Gateway bridge program aimed at building college skills and reducing the achievement gap for AIAN students before they begin freshmen year. The project will also leverage the UMM access to the AIAN students and communities to pursue a series of activities aimed at promoting astrophysics (and science, more broadly) to the AIAN communities. Indigenous Astronomy workshops will be organized each semester, targeting the UMM, UMTC and AIAN communities. Other activities will include Astrophysics Days at UMM each semester, which will involve public lectures by UMTC astrophysics faculty, technical workshops, portable planetarium shows, and public observing nights at the UMM telescope. This award advances the goals of the Windows on the Universe Big Idea.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.