domingo, 8 de septiembre de 2013

nsf.gov - News - NSF Frontiers in Earth-System Dynamics awards explore links among Earth processes and systems

Scientists investigate a changing planet now and in the past, with a view toward predicting its future,.
graphic illustration showing a termometer, the sun, ocean and ice
From burning hot to freezing cold places, FESD awardees conduct research on Earth systems.
Credit and Larger Version
September 4, 2013
The effects of the ozone hole on the Southern Hemisphere's climate; biodiversity in the Amazon/Andean forest; Earth system dynamics and human evolution in Africa; deep-Earth dynamics and long-term climate; the Earth system and its oxygen; and links among volcanoes, oceans, ice and carbon.
To explore the connections among our planet's dynamic systems, the National Science Foundation (NSF) has made awards totaling $28 million for research on these six topics. They are the second set of grants in NSF's Frontiers in Earth-System Dynamics (FESD) Program. Earth is often characterized as "dynamic" because its systems are variable over time and can respond rapidly to changes.
The FESD Program is supported by three divisions in NSF's Directorate for Geosciences (GEO): Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences, Earth Sciences and Ocean Sciences.
"FESD is one of GEO's efforts to fund high-risk, high-return research," says Roger Wakimoto, NSF Assistant Director for Geosciences.
"The awards reflect a multi-disciplinary approach that goes beyond what a single core program can support," says Wakimoto. "The 2013 awardees' projects are impressive, and will lead to exciting research discoveries."
The goals of the FESD program are to foster an interdisciplinary and multi-scale understanding of the interplay among and within the sub-systems at work on Earth, and to catalyze research in geoscience areas poised for major advances.
The program also seeks to improve data resolution and modeling capabilities to more realistically simulate complex processes and forecast disruptive or threshold events, and to improve knowledge of the resilience of the Earth and its systems.
Understanding and predicting the behavior of the complex and evolving Earth system was identified as a major challenge in the report GEOVision: Unraveling Earth's Complexities Through the Geosciences, released by the NSF Advisory Committee for Geosciences.
"Earth's systems interact with each other on different scales, linked across space and time," states the GEOVision report. "Changes in one component affect the status and function of other elements, and not always in straightforward or obvious ways."
Studying one component in isolation yields an incomplete, and sometimes misleading, picture, according to the report.
"One of the most striking characteristics of the Earth system is the presence of patterns," states GEOVision.
"Understanding how such methodical arrangements emerge over Earth's history may provide an important key to predicting Earth-system behavior."
The FESD awards address the need to discover and predict rates of change in these systems by fostering an integrated and multi-scale understanding of Earth's processes and systems, improving data resolution and modeling capabilities to discover and predict how rapidly these processes and systems are changing, and determining how resilient they are to the effects of human activities.
The recent human footprint on Earth has been large. The FESD awards will help scientists discover how large, as measured against naturally-occurring events; how Earth might respond; and what actions might be taken now and in the future to help shrink our global footprint.
2013 NSF FESD Awards
 Ariel Anbar, Arizona State University
 Paul Baker, Duke University
 Andrew Cohen, University of Arizona
Charles Langmuir, Harvard University
Cin-Ty Lee, William Marsh Rice University
John Marshall, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
-NSF-
Media Contacts Cheryl Dybas, NSF (703) 292-7734 cdybas@nsf.gov
Related WebsitesNSF News: NSF Advisory Committee Offers New View for the Geosciences:
http://www.nsf.gov/geo/acgeo/geovision/start.jsp
NSF News: First Awards Made in Frontiers in Earth-System Dynamics Program:
The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent federal agency that supports fundamental research and education across all fields of science and engineering. In fiscal year (FY) 2012, its budget was $7.0 billion. NSF funds reach all 50 states through grants to nearly 2,000 colleges, universities and other institutions. Each year, NSF receives about 50,000 competitive requests for funding, and makes about 11,500 new funding awards. NSF also awards about $593 million in professional and service contracts yearly.
Useful NSF Web Sites:
NSF Home Page:
 http://www.nsf.gov/news/
For the News Media:
http://www.nsf.gov/news/newsroom.jsp
Science and Engineering Statistics:
Volcanic erruption
Volcanoes, ice, oceans and carbon: Their connections are the subject of FESD research.
Credit and Larger Version
photo of forest and mountains in the Andes region
Scientists funded by the FESD Program are studying Andes and Amazon biodiversity.
Credit and Larger Version
Photo of iron formations in soil in a canyon
Banded iron formations: important in the development of Earth's oxygenated environment.
Credit and Larger Version
Lake Turkana and vehicles on it banks in Kenya
Deposits in Kenya's Lake Turkana help scientists link paleoclimate and human evolution.
Credit and Larger Version
Illustration showing the ozone hole in the Southern Hemisphere
FESD grantees are studying the ozone hole and its effects on Southern Hemisphere climate.
Credit and Larger Version
 
The National Science Foundation (NSF)
Guillermo Gonzalo Sánchez Achutegui

En

No hay comentarios:

Publicar un comentario

Por favor deja tus opiniones, comentarios y/o sugerencias para que nosotros podamos mejorar cada día. Gracias !!!.