76272 - Marine Ecosystems: Structures and Processes

Learning outcomes

At the end of the course, the student will have conceptual and practical knowledge of the main marine ecosystems (rocky cliffs, coastal wetlands, seagrass beds, biogenic reef and soft-bottoms), their associated communities, the ecology and functioning of these systems, and how these processes result in important ecosystem services to humans. In particular, the student will be able to: - describe the status and functioning of the various coastal habitats; - describe the profound changes induced by man over the centuries, - simulate ecological research, through the acquisition of ecological data in the marine communities.

Course contents

The lectures will cover a variety of coastal habitats. For each habitat we will analyze:

Main environmental characteristics

main communities

Main patterns, trends and functioning, with emphasis on some particularly well studied processes

Human-induced changes and threats

 

The course is structured as follows:

1) Introduction - focus on habitat loss and consequences in terms of ecosystem services

2) Intertidal rocky bottoms - experiments on the role of competition, predator-prey interactions and effects of climate change

3) Subtidal rocky bottoms and kelp forests - experiments on the role of disturbance, trophic cascades, and the effects of sedimentation

4) Estuarine environments, saltmarshes - experiments on the role of positive interactions

5) Seagrasses

6) Oyster reefs and other biogenic reefs

7) Soft-bottoms

8) Artificial man-made habitats

 

We will also have two field excursions and group discussions of selected papers

Readings/Bibliography

Bertness et al (Editors) 2014. Marine Community Ecology and Conservation. Sinauer Associates Inc.

Airoldi & Beck 2007 – Loss, status and trends for coastal marine habitats of Europe. Oceanogr Mar Biol Annu Rev

Other recommended text (especially for those who do not have a strong background in marine biology):

Kaiser et al (eds) Marine Ecology: Processes, systems and impacts. Oxford University Press

 

Additional material will be illustrated and provided during the teaching

Teaching methods

Frontal teaching

Discussion groups

Field excursion

Assessment methods

There will be 6 exams. 2 exams (1 in March and 1 in June) will be written tests (about 15 questions, both open and closed tests, focusing on the whole course programme), while the remaining 4 will be oral exams.

The dates of the exams will be posted on the site AlmaEsami. Students can book for the examination exclusively using the procedures provided by the online system Alma Exams (https://almaesami.unibo.it/almaesami/welcome.htm). Each student can not enroll in more than one exam call at a time per each examination session. Students who have not passed an exam test will be eligible to take the exam only to the second round later in the next examination session (then jumping one call).

Teaching tools

Teaching material will be available at the web site AMS Campus - Deposito istituzionale del materiale didattico. The password to access the teaching material will be given during the first teaching lesson

Office hours

See the website of Laura Airoldi