Symposium SICB 2020: How plants vs. animals solve physical problems, Austin, Texas, January 3-7, 2020

该奖项将帮助支付2020年1月在德克萨斯州奥斯汀举行的综合与比较生物学学会年会上参加研讨会和研讨会的参与者的差旅费。植物和动物对机械问题都有独特的解决方案，包括粘在表面、折叠、分散和对机械负荷的反应。这些解决方案中的一些已经成为生物灵感的来源，例如受荷叶启发的自清洁表面。研讨会将植物和动物研究人员聚集在一起，在“可能导致工程应用的机械问题的生物解决方案”的统一主题下，解决不同系统中的类似问题。一群不同的研究人员将在一个令人兴奋的跨学科研究前沿交流思想。作为本次研讨会的一部分，与会者将有机会咨询科学传播专家，通过有效的新闻稿和社交媒体帖子向公众和其他利益相关者展示他们的研究。研讨会主持人之间的会前和现场会议将促进合作和编写科学手稿。本次研讨会将在科学期刊的特刊上发表原创研究论文、研究评论和观点。在期刊特刊的基础上，还将为大学教师制定一份课程计划，以方便他们在课程中使用专题讨论会特刊作为教科书或补充教学材料。植物和动物经常进化出复杂的解决方案来解决同样的物理问题。将这些解决方案转化为仿生材料和工艺带来了新的挑战，例如可扩展性。为了理解并将生物学的解决方案转移到物理问题上，一种跨学科的方法结合了生物学、工程学和物理学的研究。一条较少有人走过的道路是明确比较动物和植物的进化解决方案，以及这些领域的研究人员使用的实验方法，这是研讨会的两个目标。研讨会将促进科学家之间的知识交流，他们分享一个给定的研究问题，但从不同的角度，使用不同的模型系统和方法来解决它，重点关注粘附，运动和分散以及对机械载荷的响应等主题。研讨会提供了一个综合的想法，同时突出了来自美国和国外的不同的，新兴的研究者的工作。研讨会将包括一个关于公众推广的讲习班，这将有助于科学家向公众推广他们的研究。在在线分组讨论和网络会议期间，将提供额外的参与机会。当科学家产生与职业相关的成果时，专业网络和合作将得到促进，例如科学出版物（原创文章，更具历史回顾性的文章和关注剩余挑战和紧急调查领域的前瞻性观点文章）和支持向公众传播的产品（新闻稿，博客文章，播客，社交媒体帖子）。此外，研讨会组织者将与教育专家合作，开发一个教育模块，以研讨会出版物为基础，作为比较生理学、比较生物力学、仿生学和综合生物学课程的教科书或教科书补充。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award will help defray travel expenses for participants in a symposium and workshop at the annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology in Austin, Texas, in January 2020. Plants and animals each have unique solutions for mechanical problems, including sticking to surfaces, folding, dispersal, and responding to mechanical loads. Several of these solutions have been sources for bio-inspiration, such as self-cleaning surfaces inspired by the lotus leaf. The symposium brings together plant and animal researchers that tackle similar problems in different systems under the unifying theme of "biological solutions to mechanical problems that might lead to engineering applications." A diverse group of researchers will exchange ideas that cross scales at an exciting frontier of trans-disciplinary research. As part of this symposium, conference participants will have the opportunity to consult with science communication experts to showcase their research to the general public and other stakeholders through effective press releases and social media posts. Pre-conference and on-site meetings among the symposium presenters will facilitate collaborations and preparation of scientific manuscripts. This symposium will result in the publication of original research papers, research reviews, and perspectives in a special issue of a scientific journal. The special journal issue will be complemented by a lesson plan for college instructors to facilitate the use of symposium special issues as textbooks or supplementary instructional material in their courses.Plants and animals evolved often complex solutions to the same physical problems. Transferring those solutions into biomimetic materials and processes comes with new challenges, such as scalability. To understand and transfer biological solutions to physical problems, an inter-disciplinary approach that combines research in biology, engineering, and physics has been used. A road less travelled is to explicitly compare the evolved solutions of animals and plants, as well as the experimental approaches used by researchers in these fields, which are two goals of the symposium. The symposium will foster intellectual exchange among scientists who share a given research question, yet address it from different angles, using different model systems and approaches, with a focus on the topics of adhesion, locomotion and dispersal, and response to mechanical loads. The symposium offers a synthesis of ideas while highlighting the work of diverse, emerging investigators from the US and abroad. The symposium will include a workshop on public outreach, which will help scientists to promote their research to the public. Additional engagement opportunities will be provided during online breakout discussions and networking sessions. Professional networking and collaborations will be facilitated as scientists produce career-relevant deliverables, such as scientific publications (original articles, a more historical review article and a forward-looking perspective article focusing on remaining challenges and urgent areas of inquiry) and products that support dissemination to the public (press releases, blog posts, podcasts, social media posts). Additionally, the symposium organizers will collaborate with educational experts to develop an educational module based on using the symposium publications as a textbook or textbook supplement in courses on comparative physiology, comparative biomechanics, biomimetics, and integrative biology.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.