Intellectual Community as a Bridge of Interdisciplinary Graduate Education in Materials Data Science
- PDF / 486,556 Bytes
- 8 Pages / 432 x 648 pts Page_size
- 34 Downloads / 150 Views
MRS Advances © 2020 Materials Research Society DOI: 10.1557/adv.2020.140
Intellectual Community as a Bridge of Interdisciplinary Graduate Education in Materials Data Science Chi-Ning Chang1, Clinton A. Patterson1, Willie C. Harmon Jr. 1, Debra A. Fowler1, and Raymundo Arroyave2, 3 1
Center for Teaching Excellence
2
Department of Materials Science and Engineering
3
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843
Abstract
Recognizing materials development was advancing slower than technological needs, the 2011 the Materials Genome Initiative (MGI) advocated interdisciplinary approaches employing an informatics framework in materials discovery and development. In response, an interdisciplinary graduate program, funded by the National Science Foundation, was designed at the intersection of materials science, materials informatics, and engineering design, aiming to equip the next generation of scientists and engineers with Material Data Science. Based on the 4- year implementation experience, this report demonstrates how intellectual communities bridge students interdisciplinary learning processes and support a transition from disciplinary grounding to interdisciplinary learning and research. We hope this training model can benefit other interdisciplinary graduate programs, and produce a more productive and interdisciplinary materials workforce.
BACKGROUND The Materials Genome Initiative (MGI) has advocated for an interdisciplinary approach employing an informative framework in materials discovery and development [1]. The Data-Enabled Discovery and Design of Energy Materials (D3EM) program at Texas A&M University is one of the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) funded interdisciplinary graduate programs connected to this effort. The program brings together materials science, informatics, and engineering design theory to equip the next generation scientists and engineers with skills to speed up materials discovery and development. Influenced by interdisciplinary literature, the D3EM curriculum spans three stages: disciplinary grounding, multidisciplinary courses, and interdisciplinary coursework and research [2-7]. However, in the literature, there is scarce discussion addressing learning 355
Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. Rice University, on 28 Apr 2020 at 04:07:16, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1557/adv.2020.140
barriers within and across these three learning stages. Hence, this report: 1) highlights the implementation of inter- and intra-disciplinary intellectual communities within faculty and students and 2.) demonstrates how these intellectual communities effectively bridge interdisciplinary gaps and transitions. INTERDISCIPLNARITY AND INTELLECTUAL COMMUNITY A concept familiar within interdisciplinary learning and applied to interdisciplinary program design is “common ground”. Researcher’s reviewed 129 interdisciplinary programs founded by the NSF’s Integrative Gradu
Data Loading...
