R/V BILIM March - April 2008 cruises Institute of Marine Sciences METU
|
|
R/V BILIM March - April 2008 cruises Institute of Marine Sciences METU |
|
|
SESAME Project
Southern European Seas: Assessing and Modelling Ecosystem change The project SESAME information can be found at http://www.sesame-ip.eu and is summarized below: SESAME is a 4-year European Union-funded project designed to study the Mediterranean and Black Sea ecosystems and their abilities to provide goods and services with high societal importance, such as tourism, fisheries and ecosystem stability through conservation of biodiversity. Both the Mediterranean and Black Sea have been experiencing intensive development and exploitation due to their strategic geographical position, and are equally susceptible to human pressures and climate change. SESAME has been suitably created to assess the changes that have occurred in these ecosystems over the last 50 years, while simultaneously predict changes in the ability of the two seas to sustain essential ecosystem functions in the next 50 years (http://www.sesame-ip.eu/public/about-sesame). A large number of oceanographic institutes from the Mediterranean and Black Sea countries (http://www.sesame-ip.eu/public/who-we-are) collaborate in the project. Along with these institutes, the Middle East Technical University, Institute of Marine Sciences takes part in the project and in the extensive cruises covering quasi-synchronously the entire Mediterranean and Black Sea under WP2 (http://www.sesame-ip.eu/public/educ_cruise.php), with the participation of 10 research vessels from different countries. The cruises have been named after the late Prof. Ümit Ünlüata, the former director of the Institute of Marine Sciences, METU, Turkey in memory of his contributions to Mediterranean and Black Seas oceanography, and efforts to establish oceanography as a science in Turkey. In addition to the WP2 experiments (Figure 1) performed under the ÜNLÜATA cruises, additional experiments are performed under WP3 covering the western and eastern Mediterranean and Black Sea continental shelves, Gibraltar, Sicily straits and the Turkish Straits System, to gather multi-purpose physical, biological and chemical ocean data, as well as marine and atmospheric samples for laboratory analyses.
The R/V BILIM of the Institute of Marine Sciences has sailed from Tirtar harbor near the IMS-METU campus in Erdemli, Turkey on 13 March 2008 to perform 5 legs of its cruises within the context of SESAME project. About 20 Turkish scientists are to take part in the experiments, with the participation of about 7 scientists from other countries. Within this most extensive collaborative research performed in the Mediterranean and Black Seas to date, the R/V B?L?M is scheduled to meet or work alongside with the R/V Mare Nigrum (Romania), R/V Shikmona (Israel), R/V Akvanavt (Russia), R/V Akademik (Bulgaria) for intercalibration work, in the ongoing cruises to last until May, 2008. In these cruises, a separate effort is made to (http://www.sesame-ip.eu/public/follow-the-cruises) offer the general public, and especially children of all ages, the opportunity to experience, in almost real time, life on board the research vessels via an Internet connection, including images, videos and notes from he cruises and a competition with a prize (http://www.sesame-ip.eu/public/SESAME-competition-2007-2008). Schools, and everyone interested, are invited to follow two ocean expeditions in March/April and August/September 2008. The SESAME project aims to connect different schools as well as the public in different countries to oceanographic research vessels at sea. Additional info:
|
