Course Coordinators
Prof. Yeala Shaked, The Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat .
Dr. Gilad Antler, Department of Earth and Environmental Science, Ben-Gurion University.
Lecturers
Prof. Yeala Shaked, The Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat .
Dr. Gilad Antler, Department of Earth and Environmental Science, Ben-Gurion University.
Course Brief Description
A 10-day course. The course includes lectures, research cruises, class exercises, group research projects and summary presentations.
Preparations before the course in Eilat: The students will work and submit a comprehensive exercise aimed at bringing all the students to a uniform basic background. Students will read and prepare a presentation on a term/concept related to the course or on a scientific paper.
Work after the course in Eilat: The students will continue to work on the projects and will submit group reports a month after the course ends.
The course will include oceanographic, chemical and biological aspects of nutrients - biogeochemical cycles in the water column and sediments, fluxes, physico-chemical phases in natural water, depth profiles and redfield ratios as measures for nutrient exploitation / limitation, diagenetic processes in the sediment.
The practical work will include a research cruise in which we will characterize the physical and chemical factors affecting phytoplankton in the Gulf and collect sediments for measurements and experiments. In various research projects we will study the dynamics of nutrients in sediment, dust and water, and will try to assess their importance as sources or sinks of the nutrients in the sea.
Text books:
J.L Sarmiento and N. Gruber (2006) Ocean Biogeochemical Dynamics. Princeton University Press.
Prerequisite
Course "Introduction to Marine Sciences" or a parallel course.
Homework before the course starts to bring everyone to the same level.
Affinity to the field of marine sciences, willingness for intensive and prolonged learning during long hours and intensive lab work in late hours.
The grade structure
Homework (10%)
Class exercises and participation (30%)
Group project report (40%) The report is submitted about one month after the course ends.
Project summary lecture (20%)
Audience
The course is limited to 18 graduate and 3rd year undergraduate students.
Language
The language of instruction is Hebrew, however, if students who do not speak Hebrew will take part in the course, the language of instruction will be English.