REU SITE: Planetary Habitability Over Space and Time

William Marsh Rice University, Houston TX

Investigators

Abstract

Two main concepts in Earth sciences are the scale of geologic time and the magnitude of change possible when integrating over billions of years. Tied to these ideas is the continuity of life through this great span of time. These concepts are key to understanding the natural world around us and are necessary to many aspects of a successful society, such as the generation of energy, the location of natural resources, and the development of legislation that allows for long-term social stability. Communication of these ideas to the broader US population has been weak, resulting in poor understanding of the processes that generate energy for society and ineffective and/or inefficient environmental regulations. Thus the goal of this research experience is to expose students to these central concepts of Earth history while also providing education about career opportunities available to geoscientists. Each student will be assigned a mentor who will guide them through a summer research experience related to the interaction between Earth science and life. The program will include a multi-day field trip designed to expose students to the relationships between life and physical processes, and will present field work in a form that is accessible and intellectually enriching. The program will provide students with weekly professional development seminars and will follow up with fall semester opportunities to engage with peers in research presentations. Student recruiting will be targeted to freshmen and sophomores from universities without stand-alone undergraduate Earth science programs and from local community colleges, to broaden undergraduate exposure to the Earth sciences. There are more than 100,000 community college students in the Houston area and targeting Houston's community colleges will help increase the diversity of the applicant pool. 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.