Nanoscience Connected to Life: An Interdisciplinary Traineeship Program in Bioinspired Nanotechnology

活生生的世界提供了许多令人着迷的例子，高度进化的复杂机器协同工作以维持生命。对自然建筑和过程的基本了解可以用来创造以生物为灵感的绿色新技术，以造福人类和环境健康。然而，这项具有挑战性的任务需要整合生物学、化学和物理学方面的研究，这些研究集中在最小的功能尺度：纳米尺度。这艘NSF研究培训船(NRT)名为“连接生命的纳米科学：生物启发纳米技术的跨学科培训计划”，将提供教育、研究和职业发展，帮助在新兴的生物启发纳米技术领域建立一支新的劳动力队伍。随着这一领域的快速扩张和行业接受这些新方法，社会需要一支受过独特培训和多样化的劳动力队伍。在纽约市立大学(CUNY)作为多元化学生群体向上流动引擎的声誉的基础上，这一培训将为125名研究生提供新颖而全面的研究生教育。该计划将服务于25名直接资助的受训人员，包括在STEM学习领域中代表性不足的少数族裔个人、妇女和LGBTQ+社区成员。毕业生将成为有效的领导者，他们将能够解决美国面临的复杂问题，并在能源收获、农业、医药和环境修复方面取得新的科学突破。该项目的广泛教育愿景是将新一代STEM博士生培养成协作的、系统级的思考者，他们能够跨规模和学科转换概念。该项目通过围绕共同目标加强和整合CUNY的化学、生物化学和物理学博士项目。学生们将处于有利地位，能够在融合的团队中工作，以应对与环境不稳定和健康危机有关的紧迫社会挑战。每个学生体验的核心是一个受使用启发的项目，该项目是采用生物学启发方法的几个不同研究领域中的一个。这些包括：i)能量的获取和转化，ii)设计纳米尺度的界面来测量和影响生命系统，iii)新设计的可持续绿色材料，以及iv)用于治疗和工业用途的适应性代谢系统和功能材料的开发。这些研究将跨越理论、计算和实验方法。该项目将通过将职业意识整合到整个培训期间，为纽约大学博士生在工业、政府、学术和创业领域的STEM职业生涯做好准备。该培训计划基于一种创新的整合心理模型和科学教育实验研究(IMIMSE)的培训模式，设计了 to 创建一个系统思考者的学习社区。在这个模式中，参与者通过不熟悉的概念、文化和方法交换知识和沟通。沉浸式培训模式可以在其他大学和其他融合研究领域复制。NSF研究培训(NRT)计划旨在鼓励开发和实施大胆的、具有潜在变革意义的STEM研究生教育培训模式。该计划致力于通过创新的、基于证据的、与不断变化的劳动力和研究需求保持一致的综合培训模式，在高度优先的跨学科或趋同的研究领域有效地培训STEM研究生。 该奖项反映了国家科学基金会的法定使命，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。

The living world provides many fascinating examples of highly evolved, sophisticated machinery working in synergy to sustain life. A fundamental understanding of nature’s architectures and processes can be applied to create new biology-inspired and green technologies for the benefit of human and environmental health. However, this challenging task requires integrating aspects of research in biology, chemistry, and physics focused down to the smallest functional scale: the nanoscale. This NSF Research Traineeship (NRT), "Nanoscience Connected to Life: an Interdisciplinary Traineeship Program in Bioinspired Nanotechnology," will provide education, research, and career development to help build a new workforce in the emerging field of bioinspired nanotechnology. As this field undergoes rapid expansion and industry embraces these new approaches, society needs a uniquely trained and diverse workforce. Building on the City University of New York’s (CUNY) reputation as an engine for upward mobility of a diverse student population, this traineeship will provide a novel and comprehensive graduate education for 125 graduate students. The program will serve 25 directly funded trainees, including individuals from minority populations underrepresented in their pursuit of STEM fields of study, women, and members of the LGBTQ+ community. Graduates will become effective leaders who will be able to solve complex problems facing the U.S. and provide new scientific breakthroughs in energy harvesting, agriculture, medicine, and environmental remediation. The broad educational vision of this project is to train a generation of STEM Ph.D. students as collaborative, systems-level thinkers who can translate concepts across scales and disciplines. The project strengthens and integrates chemistry, biochemistry, and physics Ph.D. programs at CUNY through convergence around common goals. Students will become well-positioned to work on convergent teams to address urgent societal challenges related to environmental instabilities and health crises. At the heart of each student’s experience is a use-inspired project in one of several different areas of research employing biology-inspired approaches. These include: i) harvesting and conversion of energy, ii) designing nanoscale interfaces to measure and influence living systems, iii) newly designed sustainable green materials, and iv) development of adaptive metabolic systems and functional materials for therapeutic and industrial use. These investigations will span theoretical, computational, and experimental approaches. The project will prepare CUNY Ph.D. students for STEM careers in industrial, government, academic, and entrepreneurial tracks by integrating career awareness throughout the training period. The training plan is based on an innovative Integrating Mental Models and Experimental Research in Scientific Education (IMMERSE) training model, designed to create a learning community of systems thinkers. In this model, participants exchange knowledge and communicate across unfamiliar concepts, cultures, and methods. The IMMERSE training model can be replicated at other universities and in other convergent research areas. The NSF Research Traineeship (NRT) Program is designed to encourage the development and implementation of bold, new potentially transformative models for STEM graduate education training. The program is dedicated to effective training of STEM graduate students in high priority interdisciplinary or convergent research areas through comprehensive traineeship models that are innovative, evidence-based, and aligned with changing workforce and research needs. 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.