S180 Life In The Oceans: Exploring Our Blue Planet
http://www.open.ac.uk/science/short
http://www3.open.ac.uk/courses/bin/p12.dll?C02S180
Code : S180 Level
: 1 Points : 10
Start date End
date UK fee*
Feb 2002 see
description £65 no online registration -
Computer required
No residential school
*Note: this
course is only available in the United Kingdom.
Description
This new course
is linked to the spectacular 'Blue Planet' BBC TV series.
It will use
a variety of media to address the following questions:
• What are the
challenges of living in the oceanic environment, and how have marine organisms
adapted to cope with them?
• Why do some
parts of the ocean continually teem with life while others have seasonal
bursts of activity?
• How do marine
ecosystems differ from terrestrial ecosystems?
• How have our
ideas about the deep ocean environment evolved?
And why do discoveries
in the abyssal depths continue to amaze us?
In working towards
answers to these questions, you will see that to understand life in the
oceans we need to consider not just marine biology,but geology, chemistry
and physics - the shape of the ocean basins, the chemistry of seawater,
and ocean tides and currents, all play crucial roles in shaping the marine
environment. The final section of the course looks at modern fishing techniques
and their far-reaching consequences for marine life, and considers what
might be done to ameliorate the present critical situation.
The course has
been written assuming that you are new to science, and introduces new scientific
ideas as you need them. However, if you have already done some science
at school, college or elsewhere, you will find opportunities to explore
some topics further. The course should help you to develop a variety of
skills, which become more sophisticated as the course progresses, and there
are questions to help you check your understanding as
you go along.