Course Description
Students will interact with materials that support the lecture:
live animals, animals in the collection, and animals and plants
that made reefs in the past. Experiments will be conducted to
explore processes typical to those on reefs.
Additional Requirements for Graduate Students:
Graduate students are required to develop a presentation for the
class and/or write a research paper.
Athena Title
Coral Reef Ecology Lab
Prerequisite
[(BIOL 1108 or BIOL 1108H) and BIOL 1108L] or (BIOL 2108H and BIOL 2108L)
Corequisite
ECOL 4280/6280
Semester Course Offered
Not offered on a regular basis.
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Student Learning Outcomes
- Students will be able to identify key phyla that form reefs based on fossil, microscopic, or preserved specimen collections.
- Students will be able to design and execute laboratory-based experiments to explore foundational biological processes as well as organismal responses to environmental change.
- Students will be able to apply concepts covered in lecture to predict experimental outcomes.
Topical Outline
- Porifera
- Cnidarians
- Flatworms
- Annelids
- Mollusks
- Arthropods
- Crustaceans
- Echinoderms
- Chordates
- Photosynthesis by anemones or jellyfish
- Feeding behavior of Cnidarians in relation to nutrition status
- Structural and morphological variation in Mollusks, and effects of shell composition on susceptibility to ocean acidification
- Feeding choice trails with Echinoderm “keystone predators”
- Feeding behavior and/or effect of climate change on Chordates, such as tunicates
- Reproduction of a jellyfish, formation of planula larva, settlement, and metamorphosis
