Syllabus
1.General features of aquatic habitats (basics of aquatic chemistry and hydrodynamics) relevant to aquatic life, basic trophic and energetic structure of aquatic ecosystem
2. Freshwater limnetic ecosystems - deep stratified lakes: particular features, seasonality, ecology of lake organisms, PEG model, diurnal vertical migration, main lakes of the world.
3. Freshwater limnetic ecosystems - shallow permanent waterbodies (fishponds, oxbows, littoral habitats): typical organisms and features, seasonality and life strategies, productivity - fish cultivation, eutrophication
4. Freshwater limnetic ecosystems - small temporal ponds (alluvial periodic ponds, ephemeral habitats, puddles, thelmata): typical features and typical organisms, their life strategies (diapause, dispersion, metapopulation concept)
5. Freshwater limnetic ecosystems - marginal and extreme aquatic habitats (peat bogs, hot springs, caves and interstitial habitats, snow and ice): peculiarity of these habitats, typical organisms and their adaptations
6. Freshwater lotic habitats - streams (springs, brooks, rivers, reservoirs): River forming landscape concept, basic difference from standing waters (hydrology, river continuum concept), reservoirs. Main world rivers.
7. Freshwater lotic habitats - streams: organisms, adaptations to life in a stream, life strategies
8. Marine ecosystems - introduction to the marine environment (characteristics of seawater, seafloor features, marine habitats - main terms, comparison to the lake ecosystems)
9. Marine ecosystems - open ocean (main groups of marine planktonic organisms, primary production in marine plankton, seasonal dynamics of productivity in various latitudes, nekton in the epipelagic zone)
10. Marine ecosystems - coastal and shelf benthic ecosystems: rocky, sandy, and muddy bottom, intertidal, vertical zonation of the littoral zone
11. Marine ecosystems- specialized benthic and coastal ecosystems in tropical zone: coral reefs and mangroves (geographical distribution, structure and zonation, main organismal groups involved and their interactions)
12. Marine ecosystems - specific coastal ecosystems of the temperate zone: kelp forests, communities of European coasts, tide pools, estuaries, brackish and hypersaline waters
13. Marine ecosystems - deepwater communities (deepwater nekton and benthos, chemosynthesis-dependent communities: hydrothermal vents, hypersaline and hydrocarbon seeps)
Annotation
Lecture "Aquatic ecosystems" provides an overview of freshwater and marine ecosystems, their basic functional structures, keystone organismal groups and crucial abiotic and biotic interactions. The basic geography of particular ecosystems is given as well.
There are two one-day excursions to demonstrate basic freshwater ecosystems.
Although there are no required prerequisites to accomplish this lecture, a knowledge of basic ecology is very welcome.