Minnesota Partnership to Foster Native American Participation in Astrophysics

明尼苏达州合作促进美洲原住民参与天体物理学

• 批准号: 2318841
• 负责人: Vuk Mandic
• 金额: $ 24.77万
• 依托单位: University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-09-01 至 2025-08-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2318841&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Minnesota; Partnership; Foster; Native; American

A new research and education partnership in astronomy will be developed between two University of Minnesota campuses, at Morris (UMM) and at the Twin Cities (UMTC), aimed at building a robust pathway for American Indian and Alaskan Native (AIAN) students to enter into the field of astrophysics. The program will interweave the courses and research strengths at both UMM and UMTC campuses. A series of frontier research projects in Multi-Messenger Astrophysics (MMA) will be pursued by UMM AIAN students, mentored by both UMM and UMTC faculty. The projects will be data-intensive, leveraging the UMTC astrophysics faculty’s access to the most modern astrophysics datasets and computing resources as well as UMM faculty’s expertise in data science. Both faculty and students will have opportunities for professional development, including workshops and other activities designed to develop communication skills, leadership and teamwork skills, management skills, gender and racial awareness, ethics, and others. This partnership will have a profound positive impact on the participation of the AIAN minority in astrophysics, as well as providing a successful template that could be replicated in other programs and disciplines.The past decade has witnessed remarkable advances in astrophysics, including the discovery of gravitational waves generated in mergers of binary systems of black holes and/or neutron stars, the first observations of the black hole event horizon, and the imaging of the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way. Students and faculty participating in the partnership will take part in research in these areas, with specific projects proposed to use MMA to refine the measurement of the expansion rate of the universe, to carry out rapid searches for astronomical merger events using the UMTC TURBO instrument, to measure correlations between gravitational waves and electromagnetic radiation, and to better understand the space environment in our solar system. In education, a new Astrophysics Area of Concentration at UMM will be established at the beginning of the partnership. UMM and UMTC faculty will take part in the UMM Gateway bridge program aimed at building college skills and reducing the achievement gap for AIAN students before they begin freshmen year. The project will also leverage the UMM access to the AIAN students and communities to pursue a series of activities aimed at promoting astrophysics (and science, more broadly) to the AIAN communities. Indigenous Astronomy workshops will be organized each semester, targeting the UMM, UMTC and AIAN communities. Other activities will include Astrophysics Days at UMM each semester, which will involve public lectures by UMTC astrophysics faculty, technical workshops, portable planetarium shows, and public observing nights at the UMM telescope. This award advances the goals of the Windows on the Universe Big Idea.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.

明尼苏达大学莫里斯分校 (UMM) 和双城分校 (UMTC) 两个校区之间将建立新的天文学研究和教育合作伙伴关系，旨在为美国印第安人和阿拉斯加原住民 (AIAN) 学生建立一个强有力的进入天文学领域的途径该项目将把 UMM 和 UMTC 校园的课程和研究优势结合起来，开展一系列多信使天体物理学 (MMA) 前沿研究项目。 AIAN 学生在 UMM 和 UMTC 教师的指导下进行，这些项目将是数据密集型的，利用 UMTC 天体物理学教师访问最现代的天体物理学数据集和计算资源以及 UMM 教师在数据科学方面的专业知识。专业发展的机会，包括旨在培养沟通技能、领导力和团队合作技能、管理技能、性别和种族意识、道德等的研讨会和其他活动。这种伙伴关系将对AIAN 少数群体参与天体物理学，并提供了一个可以在其他项目和学科中复制的成功模板。过去十年庆祝了天体物理学的显着进步，包括发现了黑洞双星系统合并中产生的引力波和/或中子星、黑洞事件视界的首次观测以及银河系中心超大质量黑洞的成像。参与该合作的学生和教师将参与这些方面的研究。领域，提出了具体项目，利用MMA完善宇宙膨胀率的测量，利用UMTC TURBO仪器快速搜索天文合并事件，测量引力波和电磁辐射之间的相关性，并更好地了解在教育方面，UMM 和 UMTC 教师将在合作之初建立一个新的天体物理学专业领域，旨在参与 UMM Gateway 桥梁计划。该项目还将利用 UMM 与 AIAN 学生和社区的联系，开展一系列旨在促进天体物理学（以及更广泛的科学）发展的活动。每个学期都会组织针对 UMM、UMTC 和 AIAN 社区的本土天文学研讨会。其他活动包括每个学期在 UMM 举办的天体物理学日，其中包括 UMTC 天体物理学的公开讲座。该奖项的进展反映了宇宙之窗大创意的目标。该奖项的法定使命是通过使用基金会的知识进行评估，并被认为值得支持。优点和更广泛的影响审查标准。