BIOEE 4570

Limnology: Ecology of Lakes, Lectures

Course Description

Course information provided by the Courses of Study 2016-2017.

Limnology is the study of fresh waters (and other inland, nonmarine environments). This course focuses on lakes and ponds as aquatic environments with distinct terrestrial boundaries where the interactions between organisms are often strong and adaptations to the aquatic environment easily recognized. Physical (light, temperature, and mixing) and chemical (dissolved elements and compounds) properties of lakes affect organisms in important ways, and lake organisms, likewise, influence the physical and chemical properties of their environment. Lakes are exciting environments for study in their own right and for gaining perspective on ecological and evolutionary processes in general.

When Offered Fall.

Prerequisites/Corequisites Prerequisite: BIOEE 1610 or written permission of instructor. Recommended prerequisite: Introductory Chemistry.

Distribution Category (PBS-AS)

• Students will understand how lakes with different basin shapes are formed, how basin shape and lake situation in the landscape and airscape influence physical water movement and the distribution of chemicals and organisms. Students will be able to infer the dynamics of lakes of different in basin shapes and situations in the landscape.
• Students will understand how physical properties of lake water such as light penetration, viscosity, and turbulence determine the nature of interactions among organisms through competition, predation and parasitism.
• Students will be able to interpret equations and graphs and will be able to use them to explain the outcomes of ecological interactions among organisms in lakes.
• Students will be able to assemble the components of lake ecosystems into a coherent understanding of how the parts interact.
• Students will become familiar with experimental and synthetic approaches to gaining knowledge about lake dynamics.
• Students will be able to assess the effects of human impacts on lake organisms and ecosystems, to understand the ecological processes underlying those effects, and to explain possible mitigation management actions.
• Students will appreciate lakes as exemplars of ecosystems and will understand how the interspecific interactions that take place in lakes provide models for understanding ecology more broadly.

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