OCN 626: Marine Microplankton Ecology Course Syllabus

Fall Semester 2009

Course Instructors:

Matthew Church (mjchurch@hawaii.edu), Office: MSB 614, 6-8779

Grieg Steward (grieg@hawaii.edu), Office: MSB 631, 6-6775

Guest Lecturer:

Karen Selph (selph@hawaii.edu), Office MSB 608, 6-7941

Lectures: Tuesday and Thursday 0900-1015, MSB 307

Afternoon Lab: Tuesday, 1500-16:15 MSB 315

4 credits

Marine Microplankton Ecology (Ocean 626) is one of several required core courses for graduate students in the Biological Oceanography Division in the Department of Oceanography at the University of Hawaii. The course includes two lectures and one afternoon laboratory per week, and covers fundamental concepts in biological oceanography specifically related to the ecology of marine microbes. Lectures, laboratories and in class discussions will be used to explore topics such as marine microbial diversity and biogeography, environmental and biological controls on plankton growth and mortality, and the role of microbes in ocean bioelemental cycling.

Grades will be earned based on three criteria: 1) Regular attendance and participation in weekly lectures and laboratories; 2) Performance on the mid-term and final exams; 3) Performance on an oral (10-15 min) and written (5-10 page) presentation of a data analysis project. Projects involve learning to retrieve, manipulate, and interpret data derived from the online Hawaii Ocean Time-series program database (http://hahana.soest.hawaii.edu/hot/hot-dogs/interface.html). Students are expected to attend all lectures and afternoon labs and are expected to come have read the required reading material. Grades will be weighted as follows: attendance and participation in lectures and labs (20%), mid-term and final exams (25% each), and written and oral presentations (15% each).

There are no required text books for the course; however, students will be assigned readings that include both primary literature and textbook chapters that the instructors feel are pertinent to the weekly themes.

Office hours are by appointment; if you would like to meet with instructors you should contact them by email (see addresses above) or in person to set up a mutually convenient time to meet.

Student Learning Outcomes:

1) Students should be able to define the major forms of life in the sea and describe the characteristics that distinguish these forms.

2) Students should be able to explain how microorganisms influence bioelemental cycling in the sea, specifically related to cycles of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus.

3) Students should be able to define processes that control microbial abundances and growth in the marine environment.

4) Students should be able to identify and explain distinguishing microbial and biogeochemical features of the following ocean ecosystems: oligotrophic ocean gyres; high nutrient, low chlorophyll regions; coastal and equatorial upwelling regions; and high latitude polar regions.

5) Students should be able to describe methodological approaches appropriate for evaluating: microbial diversity, biomass, growth, and mortality.

Fall 2009 OCN 626 “Marine Microplankton Ecology Course Schedule

Date	Time	Location	Topic	Lecturer	Readings
Tuesday Aug. 25, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Introduction/ Marine planktonic food webs	Church/ Steward
Tuesday Aug. 25, 2009	3-4:15PM	MSB 315	Introducing the Hawaii Ocean Time-series (HOT) program	Church/Steward	Church et al. (2009); Karl and Lukas (1996)
Thursday August 27, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	The ocean as a habitat	Church	Karl and Letelier (2009)
Tuesday September 1, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Life at the microscale	Steward
Tuesday September 1, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Lab Discussion: Microscale interactions	Church/Steward	Mann and Lazier (Chapter 1)
Thursday September 3, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Bioenergetics/Classification of life	Steward
Tuesday September 8, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	The ocean’s carbon cycle	Church	Feely et al. (2000); Doney (2006), Doney et al. (2009); Gruber and Sarmiento (2002)
Tuesday September 8, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Lab Discussion	Church/Steward
Thursday September 10, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	The ocean’s nitrogen cycle	Church	Gruber (2008)
Tuesday September 15, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Nitrogen cycling (cont.) and nutrient stoichiometry	Church	Arrigo (2007); Karl (2002); Eppley and Peterson, 1979, Nature 282, pp. 677-680
Tuesday September 15, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Lab disscussion-the marine P cycle	K. Bjorkman
Thursday September 17, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Biomass in the sea	Church	Cho and Azam (1990); Cavendar-Bares et al. (2001)
Tuesday September 22, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Biomass (cont.) and Primary production	Church	Falkowski (2002); Cullen (2001)
Tuesday September 22, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Calculation of cell abundances and biomass (worksheets)	Church/Steward	DNA facts, Fagerbakke et al. (1996), Heldal et al. (2003), Brum et al. (2004), Scaling, SAR11 genome (2005)
Thursday September 24, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Primary and bacterial production	Church	Ducklow (2000)
Tuesday September 29, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Plankton community metabolism and the metabolic state of the sea	Church	del Giorgio and Duarte (2002); Riser and Johnson (2008)
Tuesday September 29, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Calculation of cell abundances and biomass (cont.): Student presentations	Church/Steward
Thursday October 1, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	The metabolic state of the sea and the biological pump	Church	Buesseler et al. (2007); Ducklow et al. (2000)
Tuesday October 6, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Export and the dissolved biological pump	Church	Carlson et al. (1994)
Tuesday October 6, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Student discussion ANSWER KEY to questions	Church/Steward
Thursday October 8, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	DOM (cont.) and the HNLC condition	Church	Boyd et al. (2007)
Tuesday October 13, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Distribution of midterm-Due October 20, 2009 (9 AM) Microbes and Climate	Church
Tuesday October 13, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Student discussion: Fe fertilization of the ocean	Church/Steward	Papers 1, 2,  Papers 3, 4
Thursday October 15, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Introduction to marine viruses	Steward	Fuhrman (1999)
Tuesday October 20, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Viral abundances and distributions	Steward
Tuesday October 20, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Student discussion	Church/Steward
Thursday October 22, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Diversity and dynamics of marine viruses	Steward
Tuesday October 27, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Ecology and biogeochemical consequences of viruses	Steward
Tuesday October 27, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Student discussion	Church/Steward
Thursday October 29, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Roles of protozoa in the food web	Selph	Strom (2008), Sherr (2002)
Tuesday November 3, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Zooplankton feeding and energetics	Selph	Calbet & Landry (2004)
Tuesday November 3, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Review of concepts from the mid-term exam 1, 2	Selph
Thursday November 5, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Zooplankton ecology in the sea	Selph	Paffenhoffer et al. (2007), Strom (2002)
Tuesday November 10, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Beginning-to-End Carbon Transformations: from CO2 to Fish	Selph	Pomeroy (2001), Calbet (2008)
Tuesday November 10, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Flow cytometry lab (POST Building room 20)	Church/Steward
Thursday November 12, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Survey of marine prokaryotes	Steward
Tuesday November 17, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	The molecular revolution	Steward
Tuesday November 17, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Lab Discussion: Genomes and metagenomics from the sea	Church/Steward
Thursday November 19, 2009			Genomes to biomes: Case study Proteorhodopsin	Steward
Tuesday November 24, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Mesocosm studies of microbial ecology	Steward
Tuesday November 24, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Student HOT project  discussions	Church/Steward
Thursday November 26, 2009			Thanksgiving
Tuesday December 1, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Student Presentations	Students
Tuesday December 1, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Student Presentations	Students
Thursday December 3, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Student Presentations (cont.) Review of critical concepts in microbial ecology (Part I)	Church/Steward
Tuesday December 8, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	Review of critical concepts in microbial ecology (Part II)	Steward
Tuesday December 8, 2009	3:00-4:15	MSB 315	Lecture	Steward
Thursday December 10, 2009	9:00-10:15	MSB 307	HOT project reports due (9AM) Distribution of Final Exam EXAMS DUE: 5 PM on DEC. 17 Lecture: TBD	Church

Papers that may be useful for your HOT-DOGS projects:

List of HOT related papers up to 2007

Letelier et al. (1993)

Corno et al. (2007)

Karl et al. (2003)

Brix et al. (2006)

Neuer et al. (2003)

Karl et al. (2002)

Karl et al. (2001)

Cavendar-Bares et al. (2001)

Hebel and Karl (2001)

Steinberg et al. (2001)