Despite the relatively small size of Puerto Rico, there is a great diversity of climate, weather and environmental conditions between the various regions of the Island. This motivates a significant number of projects by scientists from various disciplines and diverse professional backgrounds incuding
- ecologists
- mathematicians
- physicists
dedicated to study several aspects of the interactions of the climate, land use and the environment, at a regional level, such as
- data collection in the field
- numerical modeling of surface growth
- quantum mechanical calculations of configuration geometry, ionization potentials and other properties of aerosol-particle-forming molecules
These topics are of interest in alternative energy sources and climatological studies, and many aspects and results of these studies have implications for other islands in the Caribbean and similar tropical areas as well.
After some discussions, various faculty members of the UPR-RP Department of Physics, suggested to establish a Resource Center focused on supporting the activities mentioned above. The resource center would serve, among other things, as a focal access point to the data and software tools, for the researchers and students as well as people outside our university research community.
The resource center will also serve as a public source of information, including the general public and in particular teachers and students of K-12 grades. We consider this an important component of the center, and beyond providing information and/or data, we will partner with interested schools and teachers to develop ideas, modules, tutorials, lessons and laboratory experiences that would enhance the Math, Physics, Biology and Chemistry curricula through the visualization and use of environment related data and concepts.
