Hello fellow marine science lovers! This is
the first of a series of blogposts in which we will tell you about our time at
Tjarno Marine Station, in Sweden, as part of the Joint School module of IMBRSea
master’s programme. Our group is formed of 5 intrepid ocean researchers-to-be
from very diverse backgrounds both in terms of our previous studies and country
of origin. The aim of the Joint School module is to replicate the process of
producing a research paper, therefore we will be planning, designing, executing
and hopefully succeeding at producing a great study!
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| This is our crew looking very confused during our first brainstorming meeting! |
Getting
to know the new lands...
Our proposed study is, on broad terms,
about the fauna (we chose snails!) we find in the microtidal zone along the
West Coast of the Swedish Baltic sea. Microtidal refers to the fact that the
tidal movements here are very small, a lot less than what most of us were used
to in central western Europe (like in France or Northern Spain) where the tides
have a 4 meter difference, meanwhile here the difference between high and low
tide is of barely 20cm! Even though the tidal movement is so small it still
creates a gradient of physical, chemical and biological properties, creating
fairly differentiated zones, depending on how close or how far the fauna and
flora are from the water and how exposed they are to open air conditions. We
were soon fascinated about this microtidal phenomenon, and our inquisitive
minds were hungry for some knowledge!
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Our very peaceful walk with
Greg (our mentor) for getting to know the area
We are now 3 long days into our Joint
School, and a lot of things have already happened… so we need to update you on
our great progress. As I mentioned above we chose to work with snails,
specifically with Littorina saxatilis, which are a commonly found Eastern
Atlantic mid-intertidal species. On the first day we went for a long walk along
the coast line around the station to take a look at the snails and what they
are up to in this northern lands. The crew soon noticed that within the
microtidal zone there are 3 fairly distinguished zones, upper drier zone, a
middle splash zone and a lower wet/submerged zone. Interestingly we saw that our
little saxatilis snails were spread out across these 3 zones. We then wondered…
do they move across the zones? Do they have a preference? What happens when the
tide goes up? And down? What triggers their movement across the zones?
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| Here you can see 4 Littorina saxatilis snails with some beautiful S-Nail polish on |
Japanese
fountains and electronics
In order to answer all these questions we
set up a plan of action. Robyn and Lukas became electronic engineers and with
average Arduino technology expertise, they had the grand task to create a
submersible marine multi-sensor from scratch! Elisa, Camille and myself (Ines)
on the other hand had a very Zen approach for the experimental set up. The idea
was to recreate the 3 zones (Dry, splash and wet) and to create the middle zone
we need waves. To create waves in the lab we squeezed our brains enough to make
strange grey matter juice and also finally constructed some not-so-calming
Japanese-bamboo-fountain-inspired wave creating devices.
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Our not-so-relaxing Japanese fountains, that replicate
the wave movement fairly well
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From left to right: Camille, Lukas and Robyn looking
very happy with the first successful trial of the Arduino sensor!
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The next steps to come will involve many
many snails, a lot of waiting, 3 Japanese bamboo fountains and a great
sturdiness from the geeky Arduino sensor. How will our little saxatilis feel
about our set up? Will they answer our questions? Keep your eyes peeled! A lot
more exciting tales to come :).
Written by Ines Fournon Berodia
Written by Ines Fournon Berodia
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