University of Miami
AC-10: Support for Sustainability Research

Graduate Program: Ph.D. in Environmental Science and Policy
The Abess Center's Ph.D. in Environmental Science and Policy program enables students to tap into synergistic research networks across a range of schools and colleges at the University of Miami, including the College of Arts and Sciences, the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, the Miller School of Medicine, the School of Law, School of Communication, School of Architecture, and the College of Engineering. The graduate program draws upon existing interdisciplinary collaborations that have been created by the Abess Center.
https://abess.miami.edu/academics/ph.d.-program/index.html

College of Engineering Research
The College of Engineering encourage students to take part in research within the 3 research thrust areas of the college. These areas include Sustainability. We host a yearly seminar to spotlight College research and then provide guidance to students with respect to getting involved.
All students in the College of Engineering who are interested in conducting sustainability research are placed in research labs.
https://www.coe.miami.edu/research/index.html

U-Link:
Interdisciplinary Inquiry, one of the transformative initiatives of the University of Miami’s Roadmap to Our New Century, supports teams of scholars from multiple disciplines in collaborative, problem-based inquiry to address the complex challenges of society. The world’s most compelling and difficult problems are complex. Addressing the challenges of climate change, for example, requires thinking about weather patterns, relationship of disease and environment/diet, coastal architecture, energy use, city planning, human communication, the role of truth in media, international relations, big data and many other fields. (See https://www.globalgoals.org for the types of topics of particular interest for the U-LINK initiative.)
https://ulink.miami.edu/

U-Link:
Interdisciplinary Inquiry, one of the transformative initiatives of the University of Miami’s Roadmap to Our New Century, supports teams of scholars from multiple disciplines in collaborative, problem-based inquiry to address the complex challenges of society.
https://ulink.miami.edu/

College of Engineering
The College of Engineering encourage faculty to conduct research within one of the three research thrust areas of the College. For example, the college hosts Collaborative Research Exchange Forums (CREFS) on a roughly yearly basis. One of the forums focused specifically on Environmental Sensing. We also host broader CREFS, e.g., nanotechnology, and some of the projects focused on energy harvesting which is consistent with the College's research thrust in Sustainability. The sustainability research in the college of engineering is referred to as Sustainable and Smart Systems. We have various research projects on energy efficiency, materials, and water reuse.

Groundbreaking Research at Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science:
The University of Miami’s Marine Technology & Life Sciences Seawater Complex was inaugurated in 2014 at the Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science. The new complex provides research and teaching laboratories in two critical areas: air-sea interactions and biology of living marine organisms, including a wind-wave-storm surge simulator capable of generating Category 5 hurricane-force winds in a three-dimensional test environment.
http://sustain.rsmas.miami.edu/

Interdisciplinary Inquiry, one of the transformative initiatives of the University of Miami’s Roadmap to Our New Century, support teams of scholars from multiple disciplines in collaborative, problem-based inquiry to address the complex challenges of society through two pillars: geography and problems. U-LINK (University of Miami Laboratory for Integrative Knowledge) addresses the “problems” pillar. The world’s most compelling and difficult problems are complex. Addressing the challenges of climate change, for example, requires thinking about weather patterns, relationship of disease and environment/diet, coastal architecture, energy use, city planning, human communication, the role of truth in media, international relations, big data and many other fields. (See https://www.globalgoals.org for the types of topics of particular interest for the U-LINK initiative.)

http://ulink.miami.edu/about/index.html

The UM Libraries supports sustainability research and learning by providing:
- Access to (through licensing and purchasing) scholarly resources in the many disciplines involved in sustainability research, including ecosystem science and policy, engineering, economics, biology, marine and atmospheric sciences, and architecture.
- Online research guides on interdisciplinary and disciplinary topics related to sustainability, such as: Ecosystem Science and Policy http://sp.library.miami.edu/subjects/ecoscience
- Research consultations and instructional sessions on such topics as sustainable development, clean water, recycling, and forestry.
- Consultations on GIS (Geographic Information Systems), data management, and other related information needs of sustainability researchers

In the last three years, the UM Libraries have added two GIS positions (a GIS Librarian and Technician) which are utilized by researchers in a range of areas, including sustainability, and a Post Doctoral Fellow in Research Data Management. We are beginning the process of hiring a Data Services Librarian who will provide support for access and analysis to data sets in a range of areas, including sustainability. We continue to assess our collection policies and related purchasing plans to ensure that we are providing the appropriate collection support for researchers.