IGERT: Training Program on Biodiversity Conservation and Sustainable Development

生物多样性保护的大多数主要挑战发生在发展中国家的热带和亚热带地区，研究人员必须面对生物，物理，社会，经济和治理条件的相互作用，这些条件往往与北美非常不同。 IGERT计划的核心研究旨在了解中国西南部喜马拉雅山脉东部的这些条件及其相互作用。 该地区被保护国际指定为全球生物多样性热点，是威斯康星大学麦迪逊分校和中国科学院之间长期研究合作项目的所在地。 IGERT计划将为学生提供处理生物多样性保护和可持续发展所需的跨学科和国际教育和研究经验。 课程工作将被配置为在一个主要学科提供坚实的基础;在未成年人的能力，理想情况下，在另一个领域（例如，主修生物科学和辅修社会科学的学生）;以及其他几个领域的识字能力（即，熟悉主要的理论范式和研究方法）。 校园内的新课程将包括专注于中国西南地区研究的综合研讨会，教师指导跨学科的学生团队研究真实的问题，并产生同行评审的成果。 中国科学院计划在整个项目期间向威斯康星州大学派遣学生和科学家。 他们将分别以学生团队成员和导师的身份参加这些研讨会。 研究成果将被中国科学院用于帮助开发在提高收入的同时维持生物多样性的项目。 IGERT是一个NSF范围内的计划，旨在满足教育美国博士的挑战。具有跨学科背景的科学家和工程师，在所选学科的深厚知识，以及未来职业需求所需的技术，专业和个人技能。该计划旨在通过建立创新的研究生教育和培训新模式，在超越传统学科界限的合作研究的肥沃环境中促进研究生教育的文化变革。

Most of the major challenges of biodiversity conservation occur in tropical and subtropical regions of developing countries, where researchers must confront the interactions of biological, physical, social, economic, and governance conditions that often are very different from those in North America. The research at the core of this proposed IGERT program is aimed at understanding these conditions and their interactions in the eastern Himalayas of southwest China. This area, designated a Global Biodiversity Hotspot by Conservation International, is the site of a program for long-term research collaboration between the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The IGERT program will provide students with the interdisciplinary and international education and research experience needed to deal with biodiversity conservation and sustainable development. Course work will be configured to provide solid grounding in one major discipline; competence in a minor that is, ideally, in another area (e.g., students majoring in a biological science and minoring in a social science); and literacy in several other fields (i.e., acquaintance with major theoretical paradigms and research methods). New course offerings on campus will include integrative seminars focused on the southwest China research, with faculty mentoring interdisciplinary student teams working on real problems and producing peer reviewed outputs. The Chinese Academy of Sciences plans to send students and scientists to the University of Wisconsin throughout the program. They will join these seminars as student team members and as mentors, respectively. Research results will be used by the Chinese Academy of Sciences to help to develop projects that sustain biodiversity while raising incomes. IGERT is an NSF-wide program intended to meet the challenges of educating U.S. Ph.D. scientists and engineers with the interdisciplinary background, deep knowledge in a chosen discipline, and the technical, professional, and personal skills needed for the career demands of the future. The program is intended to catalyze a cultural change in graduate education by establishing innovative new models for graduate education and training in a fertile environment for collaborative research that transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries.