REU Site: Research Experience for Undergraduates in Big Data Analytics and Machine Learning

The continued growth and development of any nation depends on two important factors: the evolution of sustainable technology and the availability of a skilled workforce that can apply the technology for the betterment of society and manage its growth through research and development. Further, to maintain the strategic position of the United States of America in both technology development and science and engineering education, it is critical to encourage and motivate a new generation of American students to pursue advanced studies in STEM disciplines.

The best way to achieve this goal is to bring highly motivated undergraduate students together within an active research group and introduce them to intellectual excitement. This will allow these students to get actively involved in research projects, help them think independently, foster creativity, and develop confidence and skills necessary to work on research projects and succeed in their chosen career paths.

It will also provide them access to strong mentors and the opportunity to begin developing their network with their classmates and seniors in their research group.

This REU Site aims to achieve three distinct goals: 1) provide a deeper understanding of big data analytics and machine learning concepts; 2) increase passion and research skills in data analytics and machine learning, and inculcate professional skills and ethical behavior among students during their undergraduate education, especially those from underrepresented population groups and/or with limited access to this research at their home institutions; and 3) provide international research experience to prepare a global STEM/data-savvy workforce. This project will support thirty undergraduate students (over a three-year period) for a 10-week long high-impact research internship experience.

During this research internship period, the participants will gain 4-weeks long international research experience in real world big data and machine learning projects at the University of Chile (UCHILE), a strong research institution in South America. Students from any STEM discipline across the nation will be recruited for this program. Specifically, efforts will be made to recruit at least 50% participants form underrepresented population including women, at least one third from outside North Dakota, and at least 60% from outside NDSU.

This project will introduce undergraduate students to unique applications of big data and machine learning tools to manage digital engineering systems. Students will develop deeper understanding of these new concepts and advance new models/algorithms to solve engineering problems for industries such as energy infrastructure, cyber manufacturing, precision agriculture, and several other cyber physical systems.

Lastly, students will work on both theory and practice to develop better insight for solving real engineering problems and demonstrating their applications in real life scenarios. The international research experience will further enable these students to join the global workforce by gaining global research and cultural experience.

This project is jointly funded by the Division of Engineering Education and Centers (Directorate for Engineering), and the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR).

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.