REU Supplement for Mid-Scale RI-1 (M1:IP): FABRIC: Adaptive Programmable Research Infrastructure for Computer Science and Science Applications

Grants and Contracts Details

Description

Regardless of which mechanism is used to request an REU Supplement, the description of the REU activity should discuss the following: (1) the nature of each prospective student''s involvement in the research project; Two REU students are recruited to work with the FABRIC project in the following ways: - Conduct experiments on FABRIC as early users - Participate in FABRIC early experiment planning, execution, and demos - Support development of learning modules for new FABRIC users, especially students will develop sample Jupyter Notebooks showing how to use basic building blocks of FABRIC These activities will develop research skills for the students in a way that will blend their research experience into the FABRIC project’s development, testing, early user experiment enablement, troubleshooting, and documentation and demo tasks. (2) the experience of the PI (or other prospective research mentors) in involving undergraduates in research, including any previous REU Supplement support and the outcomes from that support; The students will be mentored by the entire FABRIC leadership and technical team. In addition, Dr. Zongming Fei from University of Kentucky (UKy) will serve as a primary supervisor for the REU students from UKy and oversee all of their REU activities. Dr. Fei has supervised undergraduate students (REU/non-REU) in the past. Specifically, Dr. Fei has supervised undergraduate students in the following projects: · “CC*DNI Integration: Enhancing Science Through Custom Paths for Trusted Users”, NSF ACI-1541426, Office of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure (OAC), 09/01/2015 - 08/31/2019. Outcome: Six undergraduate students (Andrew Groenewold, Peter Oostema, Caleb Voss, John Geddes, Karthik Nayak, and Steven Penava) were funded by the project and obtained the experience of performing research in this NSF project. They co-authored one paper as a result of the research: Sergio Rivera, Jacob Chappell, Mami Hayashida, Andrew Groenewold, Peter Oostema, Caleb Voss, et al, “Creating Complex Testbed Networks to Explore SDN-based All-Campus Science DMZs,'''' Proc. of the International Workshop on Computer and Networking Experimental Research Using Testbeds (CNERT 2017),in Conjunction with IEEE INFOCOM, Atlanta, GA, May 1-4, 2017. They also co-authored a demo abstract accepted by IEEE INFOCOM 2017. · “An Integrated Approach to Scalable Content Delivery over the Internet”, CCR-0204304, 08/15/2002-07/31/2006. Outcome: One undergraduate student (Troy M. Thompson) was hired as a REU-funded student by this project. He gained experience of conducting research while working on the project. (3) the nature of the mentoring that the student(s) will receive; and The two REU students from UKy will primarily work with the “FABRIC Students” team, a FABRIC sub-team launched in February 2021 including all undergraduate and graduate students working with FABRIC as interns and research assistants. The team meets weekly to discuss, plan, and track activities including, but not limited to: ? FABRIC portal learning and testing ? FABRIC experiment development, trials and tutorials ? FABRIC user support documentation review and addition The team meetings are convened and regularly attended by Drs. Wang, Fei and Paul Ruth from RENCI. Additional FABRIC team members also attend the meetings on demand based on the planned discussion topics. The team meetings provide the REU students with: ? Experience of being part of a diverse and distributed research team ? Advice and support for learning of experimentation skills ? Experience of conducting research using a national testbed In addition to the team interactions and supports, the REU students will also be supervised to conduct individualized research. Specifically, students will be tasked to work with FABRIC early experimenters (including but not limited to the FABRIC Science Design Drivers) to develop FABRIC experiments for their research projects. They will also explore new capabilities enabled by FABRIC to conduct experiments that have not been possible before. Student leadership is another emphasis for the planned REU. Specifically, these students will be among the first batch of users of the FABRIC testbed. They will help with creating and delivering tutorials at the regular FABRIC workshops to introduce FABRIC to a wider audience of scientific research and education. They will become a part of the FABRIC teams that provide hands-on instructions to new users of the FABRIC testbed. With the REU experience of working on the FABRIC, they will be the advocates and leaders of using FABRIC and other national testbeds for research and education in their community after they graduate. Timeline: Here is our one year plan from Oct. 2021 -- Sept. 2022. ? 10/2021 advertisement, evaluation and selection of candidates, ? 11/2021-01/2021 participating in the group meeting and learn the basic experiment skills using FABRIC ? 02/2022-04/2022 identifying the project to work on and have a design and a plan ? 05/2021-09/2022 finishing the project, writing a report and possibly doing a presentation. (4) the process and criteria for selecting the student(s). If a student has been pre-selected (as might be true in the case of a supplement for an ongoing award), then the grounds for selection and a brief Biographical Sketch of the student should be included. (PIs are reminded that the student[s] must be a U.S. citizen, U.S. national, or permanent resident of the United States.) We will make announcements to undergraduate students in the CS department. Students are required to submit an unofficial transcript and a brief statement less than 500 words, explaining the interest and experience relevant to the project. We will evaluate the applicants based on these criteria: 1) Interests in experiment-based network research using testbeds, such as FABRIC. We want students to be excited about the great potential FABRIC brings and have a good expectation of working with the FABRIC team. 2) Academic backgrounds, including GPA, preparatory courses and experience. We will evaluate the math and computer science background of the students and make sure that they are prepared to take on the challenging work on the FABRIC project. We understand that they will still go through the learning process and do not necessarily have all the background courses. The focus is on their readiness to start this learning process. 3) Contribution to the diversity and broadening participation. We will aim to recruit underrepresented minorities and women and students from diverse geographical regions. COVID19 Impacts and Management: We expect minimum impact on the participation of the students. We have been holding virtual group meetings and students can work remotely on the project. We expect to have local in-person meetings starting in the fall of 2021 and will strictly follow the CDC guidelines. Once necessary, we can also switch to virtual local meetings.
StatusFinished
Effective start/end date10/1/219/30/24

Funding

  • University of North Carolina Chapel Hill

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