IRES Track I: Manifestations of climate change in extreme events

人类引起的全球气候和大气环境变化是本世纪需要解决的最重大科学挑战之一。温室气体浓度的增加是自20世纪中叶以来观测到的变暖的主要原因。地球系统模型用于理解这些问题以及预测气候和环境的未来状态。然而，由于缺乏关键变量的高质量数据，特别是来自包括山脉、雨林和各种土地利用的复杂地形的数据，这些模式仍然存在很大的不确定性。这个IRES项目每年将为五名美国本科生提供在秘鲁呆八周的机会，研究气候变化的极端天气现象。秘鲁处于气候变化可能产生的潜在影响的极端一端，因此，我们将在秘鲁开展的培训可以应用于美国。学生将学习必要的研究技能，在秘鲁的背景下应用有关气候变化，影响，适应和解决方案的理论。学生们还将在秘鲁工作，应对与气候变化相关的挑战。国际经验将有助于提高参与学生的保留率和毕业率，改善项目和策略，以保持科学和工程的多样性。该项目为本科生提供具有个人挑战性的研究经验，组织良好的综合团队活动和专业发展。该计划旨在提供高质量，平衡的研究活动，积极影响参与者在科学和工程研究方面的终身职业选择。学生们将与来自秘鲁和美国的教师和研究人员合作，整合天气传感器并将其安装在无人机上，设计实验，收集和分析数据，并将结果呈现给科学和非科学观众。学生将与当地科学和工程专家合作研究复杂的地形和生态系统，并利用实验室和当地现场基础设施。拟议的活动依赖于现有和新的数据集、社会科学数据收集以及与秘鲁当地合作伙伴合作的地面和遥感测量，以研究极端天气事件，如秘鲁安第斯山脉的严重冰雹和霜冻状况以及秘鲁亚马逊地区的野火。研究活动将包括数据分析，以减轻El Niño现象，并确定应对气候变化的缩编解决方案。学生将在教师专业领域内工作，但选择并定义一个个人感兴趣的项目。每个项目将有至少两名教师导师帮助学生发展多学科方法来解决他们的研究活动。该项目包括一个强大的指导组件，旨在为未来的研究人员分享最佳实践。本科生参与研究气候变化及其对人类的社会影响，其影响远远超出了单个研究项目的技术范围，科学传播的纳入表明了研究如何直接影响社会。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。

Human-induced changes in the global climate and atmospheric environment are among the most significant scientific challenges to address this century. Increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases are the dominant cause of observed warming since the mid-20th century. Earth System Models are used to both understand these issues as well as project the future state of the climate and the environment. However, significant uncertainties remain in these models, owing to the lack of high-quality data of key variables, especially from complex terrains that encompass mountains, rainforests, and a variety of land uses. This IRES project will provide five U.S. undergraduate students each year the opportunity to spend eight weeks in Peru to study the extreme weather manifestations of climate change. Peru is on the extreme side of potential impacts that climate change can have, and therefore, the training we will develop in Peru could be applied to the United States. Students will learn the necessary research skills to apply theories about climate change, impacts, adaptation, and solutions within the Peruvian context. Students will also work in Peru to address challenges associated with climate change. The international experiences will contribute to increasing retention and graduation rates of participating students, improve programs and strategies for sustaining diversity in science and engineering.The program provides individually challenging experiences in research and well-organized integrative team activities and professional development to undergraduate students. The program aims to provide a high quality, and balanced research activities that positively impact the participants’ lifelong career choices in science and engineering research. The students will work with faculty and investigators from Peru and United States to integrate weather sensors and mount them on a drone, design experiments, collect and analyze data, and present results to scientific and non-scientific audiences. Students will study complex terrain and ecosystems in collaboration with local scientific and engineering experts, and utilize laboratory and local field infrastructure. Proposed activities rely on existing and new data sets, social science data collection, and ground-based and remote sensing measurements in collaboration with local partners in Peru to study extreme weather events such as severe hailstorms and frost conditions in the Peruvian Andes, and wildfires in the Peruvian Amazon. Research activities will include data analyses to mitigate El Niño phenomena and identify Drawdown solutions to combat climate change. Students will work within the areas of faculty expertise but choose and define a project of personal interest. Each project will have at least two faculty mentors to help the students develop with multidisciplinary approaches to tackle their research activities. This program includes a robust mentoring component aimed at sharing best practices for future researchers. The involvement of undergraduates in research with exposure to climate change and the social impact on humankind has implications well beyond the technical scope of the individual research projects, and the inclusion of science communication shows how research can directly impact society.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.