CI-TEAM Demo: Collaborative Research: An Online Community to Broaden Access to the Computational Research Enterprise

这个CI-TEAM示范项目的目的是利用CDI项目，通过将长期愿景与发展社区的重点战略相结合，建立一个计算研究的在线社区。长期愿景是建立一个在线社区，在这个社区中，本科生研究人员成为执行计算项目的关键劳动力。作为演示，该团队正在实现一个原型，将科学网关与工作流/来源管理系统连接起来，以支持计算、项目管理和数据管理。在线社区包括越来越多的大学和超级计算中心，从HBCUs和其他不同的网站招募的本科生与研究小组远程合作。该项目将从卡内基梅隆大学的学生开始，并在第二年加入其他大学的研究小组。该社区将由肯特州立大学的材料数字图书馆（MatDL）托管，这是一个基于社区计算项目的在线空间。该示范项目的长期愿景是利用网络基础设施重组科研企业，以扩大参与和推进基础科学研究。这种结构通过向全国的本科生提供高质量的研究经验，拓宽了学生的机会。它还扩大了其他人的参与，特别是在重视研究但教学或行政负担高的机构中担任职位的博士，这些机构阻碍了研究效率。目前研究企业的结构非常青睐那些几乎可以把全部时间都花在研究上的人，这样他们就能以有竞争力的速度把一个想法从开始到发表。拟议中的在线研究社区允许个人利用他们可用的时间做出有意义的贡献。目前的研究企业结构也有利于在高度活跃的研究环境中工作的个人，在这种环境中，与当地同事的合作可以帮助保持个人的独立性。S研究当前和至关重要。拟议的社区为建立这种合作提供了更具包容性的机制。最后，目前的结构有利于那些能够随时接触到有才华的研究生和本科生的机构。拟议的社区通过允许所有专家招募本科生或其他新手参与研究项目来部分解决这个问题。降低这些障碍有可能大大扩大专家和新手参与计算研究的受众。这扩大了基础科学研究的劳动力，既可以为社区中发生的项目汇集本科生的工作，也可以帮助培养未来的计算科学家。在这个示范项目中，网络基础设施将使支持跨学科团队所需的技术和社会结构成为可能，专家和新手可以在计算研究项目上远程协作。这种虚拟项目团队的有效运作是一个长期愿景的关键推动者，它重构了科学研究企业，以扩大专家、新手和机构之间的访问和参与。这一长期愿景扩展了演示项目，以支持持续创建在线项目团队的包容性过程：实验人员发布需要计算的问题；计算专家选择感兴趣的问题，要么自己进行计算，要么同意作为本科生和其他新手的导师；新手在专家导师的指导下完成指定的研究任务。更广泛的影响本示范项目针对目前没有机会参与计算研究项目的本科生，特别是来自代表性不足群体的学生。该项目减少了地理和时间障碍，同时增加了对资源和设施的访问，pi期望这个项目的虚拟特性将邀请那些没有参加更传统的本科研究体验项目的学生，如NSF的本科生研究体验项目（REUs），因为需要在夏季在当地工作。

The aim of this CI-TEAM Demonstration Project, leveraging a CDI project, is to build an online community for computational research, by coupling a long-term vision with a focused strategy for growing that community. The long-term vision is an online community in which undergraduate researchers become a key part of the workforce for carrying out computational projects. As a demonstration, this team is implementing a prototype bridging a scientific gateway with a workflow/provenance management system to support computation, project management, and data management. The online community includes an expanding group of universities and supercomputing centers, in which undergraduates, recruited from HBCUs and other diverse sites, work remotely with research groups. The project will begin with students from Carnegie Mellon University and add research groups from other universities in the second year. The community will be hosted by the Materials Digital Library (MatDL) at Kent State University, an online space for community-based computational projects. The long-term vision enabled by this demonstration project uses cyberinfrastructure to restructure the scientific research enterprise in a way that both broadens participation and advances fundamental scientific research. The structure broadens access for students by making high quality research experiences available to undergraduates nationwide. It also broadens participation for others, including especially PhDs in positions at institutions where research is valued, but where high teaching or administrative loads serve as a barrier to research productivity. The current structure of the research enterprise highly favors individuals who can spend nearly full time on research and so take an idea from inception to publication at a competitive pace. The proposed online research community allows individuals to make meaningful contributions with the time they have available. The current structure of the research enterprise also favors individuals in highly research active environments where collaborations with local colleagues can help keep an individual?s research current and vital. The proposed community provides more inclusive mechanisms for establishing such collaborations. Finally, the current structure favors those in institutions with ready access to a work force of talented graduate and undergraduate students. The proposed community partially addresses this by allowing all experts to recruit undergraduates or other novices to participate in research projects. Lowering these barriers has the potential to substantially broaden the audience of both experts and novices who can participate in computational research. This expands the workforce for fundamental scientific research, both by pooling undergraduate work for the projects occurring in the community and by helping train future computational scientists.Intellectual meritIn this demonstration project, cyberinfrastructure will enable both the technical and social constructs needed to support interdisciplinary teams in which experts and novices collaborate remotely on computational research projects. The efficient functioning of such virtual project teams is the key enabler for a long-term vision that restructures the scientific research enterprise to broaden access and participation across experts, novices, and institutions. This long-term vision extends the demonstrationproject to support an inclusive process for the continual creation of online project teams: experimentalists post problems which require computations; computational experts select problems of interest and either perform the calculations themselves or agree to serve as mentors for undergraduates and other novices; and novices sign on to complete specified research tasks under the guidance of expert mentors.Broader ImpactThis demonstration project targets undergraduates who do not currently have opportunities to participate in computational research projects, including especially students from under-represented groups. The PIs expect that the virtual character of this project, which reduces geographic and time barriers while increasing access to resources and facilities, will be inviting to students who do not participate in more traditional Undergraduate Research experience programs, such as NSF's Research Experiences for Undergraduate (REUs), because of needs to work locally during the summer.