NSF-Simons National Institute for Theory and Mathematics in Biology

生物体展现出无数的能力，使它们能够茁壮成长，并调整和适应它们多变的生存条件。这些能力是在物理的、化学的、环境的和进化的约束下产生的。由于这个原因，擅长结合约束的数学领域特别适合阐明约束在生物学中的作用。从数学和生物学的角度对约束的理解为跨学科研究提供了一座独特的桥梁，数学研究将促进生物学知识的发展，而生物学研究将催化新的数学。该项目资助在芝加哥建立由西北大学和芝加哥大学领导的国家生物学理论与数学研究所（NITMB）。该项目的使命是创建一个全国性的合作研究社区，该社区将产生新的数学结果，并将通过理论、数据为基础的数学模型以及计算和统计工具揭示支配生命的基本原理。NITMB所做的研究将支持环境、生物医学和技术发展等不同领域的进步。NITMB将使用一套环环相扣的战略和举措，这将有助于发展多样化的劳动力，同时确保对研究界产生广泛的影响。地理位置相同的NITMB成员将在芝加哥市中心共享空间，方便美国和世界各地的合作者访问。NITMB将通过围绕五个相互关联的主题组织的创新研究计划来实现这一愿景，选择这些主题是因为它们反映了生物系统的关键能力并与开放的数学问题相互联系。这些主题——保真度和变异、适应度和优化、信息处理、学习和适应、预测和预期——在生物和数学科学的分支学科之间建立了桥梁，确保一个领域的研究将支持其他领域的进展。这些主题还反映了NITMB的跨学科组织结构，确保培训和社区建设活动促进跨学科的深入互动。NITMB将取得许多基础进展，包括：对生物相关非自治环境中的动力系统的新的数学理解；从局部行为中提取全局数学模型的新工具；定义控制适应度和函数变量的新理论严格定义细胞状态和发育过程中的状态转换；以及从集体神经活动中产生行为的定量模型。NITMB项目将创建一个充满活力的国际社区，这个社区将持续数十年，并在生物学和数学方面产生基础进步，这将为公共卫生、环境和其他应用领域的进一步发展提供信息。有针对性的研究项目将汇集数学家和生物学家合作，培养学生和博士后成为学科界面的未来领导者。NITMB将参与广泛的教育、劳动力发展和扩大包括不同社区在内的参与活动。它的教育计划将覆盖K-12年级的学生，采用一种行之有效的策略，将中学生与研究生导师配对，建立持久的伙伴关系。NITMB还将在一个高度多元化的城市与社区合作伙伴一起为本科生、研究生和学士学位后的学生和教师提供培训。包容是NITMB所有教育和培训活动的核心价值。各种各样的科学长期计划、研讨会和会议将加强数学和生物学之间的合作，并确保NITMB研究的科学成果影响基础研究和应用研究的广泛领域。除了国家科学基金会的资助外，这个项目还得到了西蒙斯基金会的慷慨支持。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。

Living organisms exhibit myriad capabilities that allow them to flourish and to adjust and adapt to their variable conditions of existence. These capabilities have emerged under a set of constraints that are physical, chemical, environmental, and evolutionary in nature. For this reason, fields of mathematics that are adept at incorporating constraints are particularly well-suited to illuminating the roles of constraints in biology. An understanding of constraints from both mathematical and biological perspectives provides a unique bridge for interdisciplinary research, with mathematical research that will advance knowledge of biology, and biology research that will catalyze new mathematics. This project funds the establishment of a National Institute for Theory and Mathematics in Biology (NITMB) in Chicago led by Northwestern University and the University of Chicago. The mission of this project is the creation of a nationwide collaborative research community that will generate new mathematical results and will uncover the fundamental principles governing life through theories, data-informed mathematical models, and computational and statistical tools. The research done by the NITMB will support advances in areas as diverse as the environment, biomedicine, and technology development. The NITMB will use an interlocking set of strategies and initiatives that will help develop a diverse workforce while ensuring broad impacts on the research community. Geographically co-located NITMB members will share space in downtown Chicago that is readily accessible to collaborators across the US and the world.The NITMB will realize this vision via an innovative research program organized around five interrelated themes, selected because they reflect key capabilities of biological systems and interconnect with open mathematical problems. These themes - Fidelity and Variation, Fitness and Optimization, Information Processing, Learning and Adaptation, and Prediction and Anticipation - establish bridges across subdisciplines of biological and mathematical sciences, ensuring that research in one domain will support advances in the others. The themes also reflect the cross-disciplinary organizational structure of the NITMB, ensuring that training and community-building activities foster deep interactions across disciplines. The NITMB will achieve numerous foundational advances, including: a new mathematical understanding of dynamical systems in biologically relevant non-autonomous settings; new tools for extracting global mathematical models from local behavior; new theory for defining variables governing fitness and function; rigorous definitions of cell states and state transitions in development; and quantitative models of the emergence of behavior from collective neural activities. NITMB programs will create a vibrant international community that will endure for decades and generate foundational advances in biology and mathematics that will inform further developments in public health, the environment, and other applications. Targeted research projects will bring together mathematicians and biologists to collaborate and train students and post-doctoral fellows to become future leaders at the disciplinary interface. The NITMB will engage in a broad array of education, workforce development, and broadening participation activities that will include diverse communities. Its education initiatives will reach students from the K-12 level, using a proven strategy to pair middle-schoolers with graduate student mentors in lasting partnerships. The NITMB will also develop training for undergraduates, graduates, and post-baccalaureate students and teachers with community partners in a highly diverse city. Inclusion is a core value integrated into all NITMB education and training activities. A wide variety of scientific long programs, workshops, and conferences will enhance collaboration between mathematics and biology and ensure that the scientific outcomes of the NITMB’s research impact wide-ranging sectors of basic and applied research.In addition to funding from the National Science Foundation this project is generously supported by the Simons Foundation.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.