(Press-News.org) RIVERSIDE, Calif. — Researchers at the University of California, Riverside have conducted a study showing that many skills and practices that could help scientists make use of technological and computational opportunities are only marginally being taught in California's formal graduate programs in the environmental sciences.
The researchers found, too, that graduate students in the state were, in general, not engaged in data management practices. Of the students surveyed who had already completed their graduate degree, only 29.3 percent had made their research data products available online. Further, one-third of the surveyed students whose research was in progress were unfamiliar with creating metadata for their data sets.
"These findings raised a red flag for us," said Rebecca R. Hernandez, the lead author of the study published in the December 2012 issue of BioScience. "We conducted the study because we were concerned that early career and aspiring scientists were not being trained with the skills and tools they will need to handle large, complex data sets that have become 'normal' in scientific labs and institutions across the globe."
Hernandez explained that the findings suggest that scientists are not being trained as well as they could be in keeping up with the pace of technology and computation.
"At a time when jobs have become internationally competitive, scientists also need employable skills," she said. "Knowing basic programming or how to infer meaningful and accurate information from large data sets could be the difference between unemployment and a job offer. Moreover, data sets are useful beyond their initial application making them a valuable and powerful commodity. If graduate students are not trained in data archival methods, they may be less likely to archive data sets in future research endeavors, resulting in a huge loss of knowledge and opportunity to the academic community."
Nearly 500 scientists participated in the UC Riverside study. Hernandez and colleagues conducted an online survey in June-August 2011 and solicited responses from master's and doctoral students in academic departments related to environmental or ecological sciences from 27 California universities, including 4 private schools, 9 public universities in the UC system, and 14 public universities in the California State University system.
The researchers focused on environmental sciences because the field includes biologists, plant scientists, geneticists, ecologists, modelers, oceanographers, earth system scientists, evolutionists, foresters, geographers, energy scientists, and others.
"To administrators and educators, our study suggests several areas that may enrich the education of environmental scientists, including coursework in the computer and information sciences; proficiency in programming, computation, and the analysis of large and complex data-sets; skills in the application of advanced technologies to the scientific method; interdisciplinary collaborations; and the understanding and practice of proper data management," Hernandez said.
The research team is hopeful that the study will embolden scientists at all career stages to be more proactive in getting the skills they need to solve environmental problems and imparting these skills to the next generation.
"We also hope more scientists learn about proper data management and commit to archiving their data online for everyone to freely use and re-use," Hernandez said.
The study was conducted while Hernandez was a junior specialist working for Michael F. Allen, the director of UCR's Center for Conservation Biology and the principal investigator of the research project. Currently, Hernandez is a Ph.D. student at Stanford University where she is examining processes that elucidate the functioning of the Earth system and cover a broad range of topics from global environmental change to renewable energy systems.
"I am supporting my analyses with advanced technologies, field methods, and computational programming," she said. "And yes, I plan to archive all my research data sets in online repositories!"
INFORMATION:
The study was funded by the National Science Foundation and the Center for Embedded Networked Sensing.
Hernandez and Allen were joined in the study by Matthew S. Mayernik and Michelle L. Murphy-Mariscal.
The University of California, Riverside is a doctoral research university, a living laboratory for groundbreaking exploration of issues critical to Inland Southern California, the state and communities around the world. Reflecting California's diverse culture, UCR's enrollment has exceeded 21,000 students. The campus will open a medical school in 2013 and has reached the heart of the Coachella Valley by way of the UCR Palm Desert Center. The campus has an annual statewide economic impact of more than $1 billion. A broadcast studio with fiber cable to the AT&T Hollywood hub is available for live or taped interviews. UCR also has ISDN for radio interviews. To learn more, call (951) UCR-NEWS.
California's graduate students in environmental sciences lag behind in technology, computation
Students are also generally untrained in archiving data, UC Riverside study finds
2012-12-20
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Delusions of gender: Men's insecurities may lead to sexist views of women
2012-12-20
He loves her, he loves her not.
A new study led by Joshua Hart, assistant professor of psychology, suggests that men's insecurities about relationships and conflicted views of women as romantic partners and rivals could lead some to adopt sexist attitudes about women.
The study was recently published in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, a peer-reviewed journal.
Hart and his co-authors, Jacqueline Hung '11, a former student of Hart's, and psychology professors Peter Glick of Lawrence University and Rachel Dinero of Cazenovia College, surveyed more than 400 ...
Young offenders who work, don't attend school may be more antisocial
2012-12-20
Many high school students work in addition to going to school, and some argue that employment is good for at-risk youths. But a new study has found that placing juvenile offenders in jobs without ensuring that they attend school may make them more antisocial.
The study, by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh, Temple University, and the University of California, Irvine, appears in the journal Child Development.
While evidence suggests that working long hours during the school year has negative effects on adolescent antisocial behavior among middle- and upper-income ...
Topics of teen sibling fights affect anxiety, depression, self-esteem
2012-12-20
Fights between siblings about simple things, like whose turn it is to empty the dishwasher, aren't harmless. Rather, such fights are about equality and fairness, and they can lead to depression, according to a new study.
The longitudinal research, by researchers at the University of Missouri, appears in the journal Child Development.
Although teen siblings fight about a lot of different issues, many of their fights can be categorized as being about equality and fairness (for example, whose turn it is to empty the dishwasher) or invasion of personal space (for example, ...
Supportive role models, coping lead to better health in poor teens
2012-12-20
Low-income teenagers who have supportive role models and engage in adaptive strategies have lower levels of a marker for cardiovascular risk than low-income teens without such resources, according to a new study.
The study, by researchers at Northwestern University and the University of British Columbia, is published in the journal Child Development.
"Low socioeconomic status is one of the strongest determinants of chronic disease in developed countries," notes Edith Chen, professor of psychology and faculty fellow at the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern ...
Motivation, study habits -- not IQ -- determine growth in math achievement
2012-12-20
It's not how smart students are but how motivated they are and how they study that determines their growth in math achievement. That's the main finding of a new study that appears in the journal Child Development.
The study was conducted by researchers at the University of Munich and the University of Bielefeld.
"While intelligence as assessed by IQ tests is important in the early stages of developing mathematical competence, motivation and study skills play a more important role in students' subsequent growth," according to Kou Murayama, postdoctoral researcher of ...
Toddlers' language skills predict less anger by preschool
2012-12-20
Toddlers with more developed language skills are better able to manage frustration and less likely to express anger by the time they're in preschool. That's the conclusion of a new longitudinal study from researchers at the Pennsylvania State University that appears in the journal Child Development.
"This is the first longitudinal evidence of early language abilities predicting later aspects of anger regulation," according to Pamela M. Cole, liberal arts research professor of psychology and human development and family studies at Pennsylvania State University, who was ...
Neuroscience: The extraordinary ease of ordinal series
2012-12-20
Familiar categories whose members appear in orderly sequences are processed differently than others in the brain, according to new research published by David Eagleman in the open access journal Frontiers in Neuroscience on December 20th, 2012. The study suggests that ordinal sequences have a strong spatial quality and activate a region of the brain not thought to be directly involved in language acquisition and production. Also, sequences shown in the correct order stimulated less brain activity in comparison to sequences that were not in the correct order, implying that ...
USDA explores using novel genetic labs for faster detection of E. coli
2012-12-20
Pina Fratamico is on the quest to find the easiest and fastest way to test for harmful Escherichia coli in ground beef. In an article published in Frontiers in Microbiology on the 20th of December, she explores using a next-generation real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) system to discover specific gene targets that indicate the presence of dangerous foodborne pathogens. The results show that assays performed using this PCR system are rapid, sensitive, and reliable.
"Testing using these types of systems is faster, easier, and more reproducible than previous methods, ...
Removing protein 'garbage' in nerve cells may help control 2 neurodegenerative diseases
2012-12-20
WASHINGTON — Neuroscientists at Georgetown University Medical Center say they have new evidence that challenges scientific dogma involving two fatal neurodegenerative diseases — amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), and frontotemporal dementia (FTD) — and, in the process, have uncovered a possible therapeutic target as a novel strategy to treat both disorders.
The study, posted online today in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, found that the issue in both diseases is the inability of the cell's protein garbage disposal system to "pull out" and destroy TDP-43, a powerful, ...
Sibling squabbles can lead to depression, anxiety
2012-12-20
Holiday presents will soon be under the tree for millions of adolescents. With those gifts may come sibling squabbles over violations of personal space, such as unwanted borrowing of a fashionable clothing item, or arguments over fairness, such as whose turn it is to play a new video game. Those squabbles represent two specific types of sibling conflict that can have different effects on a youth's emotional health, according to a multi-year study by a University of Missouri psychologist. With these findings, parents can learn how to bring peace to the home and encourage ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
KAIST Develops Retinal Therapy to Restore Lost Vision
Adipocyte-hepatocyte signaling mechanism uncovered in endoplasmic reticulum stress response
Mammals were adapting from life in the trees to living on the ground before dinosaur-killing asteroid
Low LDL cholesterol levels linked to reduced risk of dementia
Thickening of the eye’s retina associated with greater risk and severity of postoperative delirium in older patients
Almost one in ten people surveyed report having been harmed by the NHS in the last three years
Enhancing light control with complex frequency excitations
New research finds novel drug target for acute myeloid leukemia, bringing hope for cancer patients
New insight into factors associated with a common disease among dogs and humans
Illuminating single atoms for sustainable propylene production
New study finds Rocky Mountain snow contamination
Study examines lactation in critically ill patients
UVA Engineering Dean Jennifer West earns AIMBE’s 2025 Pierre Galletti Award
Doubling down on metasurfaces
New Cedars-Sinai study shows how specialized diet can improve gut disorders
Making moves and hitting the breaks: Owl journeys surprise researchers in western Montana
PKU Scientists simulate the origin and evolution of the North Atlantic Oscillation
ICRAFT breakthrough: Unlocking A20’s dual role in cancer immunotherapy
How VR technology is changing the game for Alzheimer’s disease
A borrowed bacterial gene allowed some marine diatoms to live on a seaweed diet
Balance between two competing nerve proteins deters symptoms of autism in mice
Use of antifungals in agriculture may increase resistance in an infectious yeast
Awareness grows of cancer risk from alcohol consumption, survey finds
The experts that can outsmart optical illusions
Pregnancy may reduce long COVID risk
Scientists uncover novel immune mechanism in wheat tandem kinase
Three University of Virginia Engineering faculty elected as AAAS Fellows
Unintentional drug overdoses take a toll across the U.S. unequally, study finds
A step toward plant-based gelatin
ECMWF unveils groundbreaking ML tool for enhanced fire prediction
[Press-News.org] California's graduate students in environmental sciences lag behind in technology, computationStudents are also generally untrained in archiving data, UC Riverside study finds