Biophysical Interactions in Marine Ecosystems

PhD course reserved for biology PhD candidates.

The course will not be run if fewer than 5 students register for it (including BIO-3031)

The course is not available as a singular course.

Through lectures, seminars, labs and data labs the students will learn how physical processes impact marine life on small to large scales. The lectures and seminars will give the students the theoretical background to understand biological-physical interactions and to evaluate how these impact variability in marine production in time and space. During the lab day students will study a biological-physical interaction on small scale. During data labs students will learn how to analyse and present data from selected modern oceanographic instruments, including satellite data and data collected during Bachelor courses BIO-2010 and BIO-2516.

Student who have completed BIO-8031 will be able to

Knowledge

• understand biophysical interactions in marine pelagic ecosystems
• thoroughly understand how physical processes influence and interact with primary and secondary producers

• conclude on the knowledge gained to examine spatio-temporal varibality in marine systems

Skills

• critically evaluate different literature and data sources, and use these skills to understand biophysical interactions in marine ecosystems
• critically examine scientific methods used to obtain and analyse physical and biological marine data

• master relevant and up-to-date methods in biological-physical oceanography
• combine physical and biological data into coherent graphs and reports
• challenge complex scientific articles with respect to data resolution and inferred results

General competence

• work independently and in collaboration with marine scientific data
• synthesise scientific data and results into written essays and reports
• prepare a scientific topic for oral presentation
• debate and orally present in groups

Blocks with 4 hrs lecture, 2 hrs seminars and 4 hrs data lab will be spread throughout the spring semester. The essay and the data lab report will prepare students to actively synthesize the information learned during the lectures. Students will partly work with data collected during the Bachelor education to study meso-scale interactions. They will also learn how to use freely available research data for analysing biological-physical interactions on large scale.

Language of instruction and examination

English.

Re-sit examination

A re-sit examination will be arranged for students that did not pass the oral examination. No re-sit will be organised for the essay or the report.

Year / Semester ↓

Responsible unit: Department of Arctic and Marine Biology E-mail: ambstudie@hjelp.uit.no

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