The School of Science faculty at The College of New Jersey (TCNJ), a primarily undergraduate institution, are engaged in novel, cutting edge research with undergraduate students. Engaging undergraduates in closely mentored research is critical to developing the next generation of scientists, and for providing deep intellectual growth for students as they pursue their degrees. This grant funded the acquisition of hardware to significantly upgrade and enhance TCNJ's high performance computing (HPC) cluster, the Electronic Laboratory for Science and Analysis (ELSA). 

Intellectual merit: The ELSA cluster has: (1) significantly enhanced the research capacity and resulting scientific discoveries made by TCNJ's School of Science faculty members and their undergraduate research teams; (2) exposed a greater number of undergraduate student researchers to this powerful computational infrastructure through closely mentored research during the academic year and throughout the summer, including through the Mentored Undergraduate Summer Experience program and summer HPC workshops; (3) created opportunities for nearly 1000 students per year in a variety of courses to engage with the HPC cluster; and (4) improved access to HPC resources for students traditionally underrepresented in STEM, as well as to researchers outside of TCNJ through our ongoing, successful collaboration with Open Science Grid. Research performed on the cluster included: computational biophysics of proteins, genomic studies of honeysuckles, mathematical modeling of cancer therapeutics, the modeling of relativistic jets and variability in quasars and blazars, computational modeling of human crowd motion and behavior, and geophysics, amongst other topics.

Broader Impacts: The presence of the ELSA cluster on campus has allowed 21 School of Science faculty to engage 100 undergraduate students in authentic, mentored research projects over the three-year award period. In addition, between 750 - 1,050 students accessed the ELSA cluster in a wide range of courses each year (including courses in Physics, Mathematics and Statistics, Biology, Computer Science, Chemistry, and Business), further enhancing the computational training of TCNJ students and their exposure to high performance computing tools and methods. Post-graduation outcomes for students engaged in research using the ELSA cluster are quite varied and include enrollment in PhD programs, post-graduate health education (e.g., medical and dental school), or being hired directly into jobs within industry. Students and faculty have presented their research projects at local, regional, and national meetings, and students have been included as co-authors on published research that has been accomplished using the ELSA cluster (26 papers have been published by ELSA user groups during the three-year award period). Additionally, a major goal of the TCNJ School of Science is to increase diversity of the STEM workforce through training of our undergraduates, and the ELSA cluster has helped us to achieve this goal within the computational sciences. For example, the percentage of female research students using the ELSA cluster has increased from 25% in Year one to 43% in Year three, and the percentage of students of color using the ELSA cluster for research has increased from 36% in Year one to 50% in Year three. The ELSA cluster has thus continued to expand research opportunities in areas of computational science across many disciplines to students who are underrepresented, helping to train  an increasingly diverse group of students and resulting in strengthening the STEM workforce.

Last Modified: 09/30/2021
Modified by: Joseph Baker