ECOSUMMER · Ecosystem approach to sustainable management of the marine environment and its living resources
FP6 — Marie Curie Actions (Human Resources and Mobility)
- Duration
- 2006-01-01 → 2009-12-31
- EU contribution
- €2,207,520
- Participants
- 8
- Scheme
- EST
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Results in brief
Final Activity Report Summary - ECOSUMMER (Ecosystem approach to sustainable management of the marine environment and its living resources)
The ECOSUMMER project trained 23 early-stage researchers (14 long-stay, 9 short-stay; 5 male and 18 female) during 46 separate training periods at 8 institutes in 3 European countries (United Kingdom (UK), Spain, Greece), delivering a total of 499 training months. Trainees were recruited from the UK, Germany, Denmark, France, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Mexico and Chile. Trainees carried out individual research projects within the training site theme (Ecosystem approach to sustainable management of the marine environment and its living resources), the majority undertaking projects which they had themselves proposed. Individual research topics included: - Bottlenose dolphin, Tursiops truncatus (Montagu 1821), trophic ecology, population structure and interactions with fisheries in Galicia (NW Spain) - Carbon cycling in continental slope sediments: the role of benthic communities - Population structure of Octopus vulgaris: combination of ageing, morphometric, genetics and GIS methods - Atmospheric and oceanic teleconnection patterns and their impact on fisheries-environment interactions - Resolving the importance of Dissolved Organic Nitrogen (DON) and Dissolved Organic Phosphorus (DOP) in marine coastal waters - Predator-prey interactions and indicators of the impact of fisheries on fish species diversity - Fished grounds to oil platform refugium: temporal changes in fish assemblages - Evolutionary genetics of the Mytilus edulis complex in Scotland. Many of the projects included collaboration with industry, including the fishing, aquaculture and oil industries. Most of the long-stay trainees registered for PhDs. The trainees presented a total of 66 talks and posters at conferences and other meetings. Including participations in work presented by colleagues, this total rises to 112. Trainees have written 21 publications as first author (46 in total) including 13 journal articles as first author (29 in total). A further 20 first-authored papers are either submitted or in preparation (48 in total). During the 4-year programme, the consortium delivered three annual summer training courses (2006, 2007, 2008) and one short winter course (2008), focused on generic skills training, in particular applied statistics. Taking into account other courses delivered by project partners, the trainees together attended 113 courses totalling 1920 hours. In the final year of the project, the majority of trainees presented their work at the 'Marine Ecosystems and Sustainability' conference in Aberdeen, UK. Several have submitted papers to the associated special issue of the journal Hydrobiologia. Two were awarded their PhDs during 2009 (Christian Lønborg and Isidora Katara). A third trainee received her PhD in May 2010 (Evangelia Gontikaki) and a fourth (Katie Longo) has submitted her PhD. The consortium will maintain contacts with the trainees over the coming years, assisting with generating publications, circulating information on employment opportunities and following their careers.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
There is an increasing need for the adoption of an ecosystem approach to the exploitation on marine resources, to promote, ecological, environmental, economic and social sustainability and preserve biodiversity. The next generation of marine scientists will need to be fully trained in these concepts. A consortium of eight internationally-recognised universities and marine science institutes in UK, Spain and Greece offers early stage training in a range of topics related to the project theme (e.g. life history biology, population, community and ecosystem ecology, immunology, physiology, molecular genetics, stock assessment, fishery and coastal zone management, fisheries economics, physical oceanography and marine GIS), with particular emphasis on an ecosystem approach to sustainable management of living resources.There partners are University of Aberdeen (including Oceanlab, Lighthouse field stations and the Scottish Fish Immunology Research Centre, UK), Fisheries Research Services Marine Laboratory (UK), Scottish Association for Marine Sciences (UK)Institute of Marine Biological Resources (Greece), Centro Oceanografico de Vigo (Spain), University of Vigo (Spain), University of Aegean (Greece) and Instituto de Investigaciones Marinas (Spain). The proposed project will run for 4 years and offer training periods of 3 to 6 months, with trainees encourage choosing projects involving stays at more than one partner centres. The partnership has extensive research experience and an excellent track record in training early stage researchers, with full quality assurance provisions in place. Training will include a strong element of core transferable sills as well as specialist training. Supervision will be provided by acknowledged experts in each field and trainees have access to a range of specialist facilities including research vessels, landers, ROVs, as well as fully-equipped state-of-the-art laboratory, computing and library facilities.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN · ABERDEENCoordinatorUnited Kingdom
- CONSEJO SUPERIOR DE INVESTIGACIONES CIENTIFICAS · MADRIDSpain
- HELLENIC CENTER FOR MARINE RESEARCH · ANAVISSOS, ATTIKISCountry levelGreece
- INSTITUTO ESPA¥OL DE OCEANOGRAFIA · VIGOCity levelSpain
- THE SCOTTISH ASSOCIATION FOR MARINE SCIENCE · OBANUnited Kingdom
- THE SCOTTISH MINISTERS, ACTING THROUGH FISHERIES RESEARCH SERVICES, MARINE LABORATORY · ABERDEENCity levelUnited Kingdom
- UNIVERSIDADE DE VIGO · VIGOCity levelSpain
- UNIVERSITY OF THE AEGEAN · MYTILINICity levelGreece
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union