Institute on the Environment (IonE)

IonE was created in response to a September 2006 report from the Provost's Advisory Committee for the Institute on the Environment. IonE will be a portal for all environment-related teaching, research, and outreach at the University of Minnesota. It spans all campuses in the University system and all colleges and departments on each campus. Prof. Deborah Swackhamer (environmental health) is the Interim Director of IonE.

IonE`s primary objective will be to address, identify, organize, and support collaborative interdisciplinary research teams to develop and disseminate innovative and practical solutions to the most pressing environmental problems of our era. It will also facilitate, coordinate, and disseminate relevant information on environmental research, courses, programs, activities and expertise of the University of Minnesota system. There will be approximately 20 to 30 Institute Fellows at any given time who hold joint appointments with IonE and with their home departments. Associate Faculty will constitute the majority of active participants (on the order of 100), and will serve as collaborators on research projects, organize synthetic events, and advise graduate students. Participants within IonE will span a range of disciplines across physical, biological and social sciences, engineering, policy, law, design, public health, and the humanities.

The University will designate physical space for the IonE in the coming months.

To read the report from the Provost's Advisory Committee on IonE, please visit http://www.academic.umn.edu/provost/interdisc/environment/.