OSU Extended Campus OC103: Exploring the Deep Lesson #1: Introduction Welcome to the Oregon State University’s Extended Campus version of “Exploring the Deep: Geography of the World’s Oceans.” In this course, we will cover many of the scientific concepts that explain observations about our oceans: how and why they formed where they did, why they are salty, why there are waves, how life exists in the oceans, and how humans are influenced by and exert influence on the oceans. This should be a fun and interesting course, especially if you like to look at or have fun in the ocean. Who am I? My name is Randy Keller. I am an Associate Professor and Instructor in the College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences at Oregon State University. I grew up in Miami, and spent a lot of time near the ocean. When I moved to Oregon to go to graduate school I continued my interest in the ocean by studying Marine Geology. I now do research on Volcanoes (both underwater and on land, both ancient and active) around the North Pacific Ocean and Antarctica (such as Penguin Island, a volcano In Antarctica shown in the photo at right), and teach oceanography and geology classes. I came to OSU because it is a great place to study the oceans. Scientists here have national and international reputations, and we consistently rank in the top 5 oceanographic institutions in the country. What this means for this class is that we have access to some amazing material from the many aspects of oceanographic research done by scientists at OSU. Oregon State University also has a strong outreach mission, and participates in many programs that promote interest and education about the ocean. One example is Oregon Sea Grant (http://seagrant.oregonstate.edu), which is a research, education, and public outreach program that helps people understand, responsibly use, and conserve ocean and coastal resources.Why Study the Ocean? • Major influence on weather and climate • Source of food, energy, medical drugs • Dangerous tsunami and storm waves occur • Important in transportation, trade • Military significance • Recreational resource • Intimately tied to the health of the planet • Culture and history What Will You Learn? • Formation of Earth and its oceans • Erosion, tsunamis, and major earthquakes along the Oregon coast • Volcanic activity just off the Oregon coast • Chemistry of seawater and underwater hot springs • Waves and coastal hazards • El Niño and La Niña • Biology of the oceans, from one-celled organisms to whales • Managing and protecting the oceans and coasts … and more! Why & WhatAssignments and Grading So a little bit about how this course will work… • There will be 3 Lessons per week posted here on Canvas for the next 10 weeks (except there will be only 2 Lessons during some weeks). Read the online Lessons as well as the assigned textbook readings given in the syllabus. There will be some overlap between the two sources, but each will have a slightly different perspective, so it will help your understanding if you read both. Each Lesson is patterned after a lecture in the face-to-face version of this class that is taught at OSU. •There are 10 Lab exercises due during the term. They are designed to work through problems that will help you understand some of the concepts we will cover. These are meant to supplement the Lessons. The Labs are worth almost 1/2 of your grade, so make sure you do them all and get them all in on time. • There are 4 Quizzes and 2 Exams that will assess how well you have absorbed the material in the Lessons and assignments. • Finally, there are 2 Homework assignments, one early to get everyone introduced to each other, and one later in the course that asks you to read about and comment on an issue in oceanography. • Keep up with all of these assignments. The syllabus lists when everything is due. • If you have questions, there is a Discussion on Canvas that is the first and best place to go to ask your question. Before posting your question, read the Discussions to make sure that someone else has not already beat you to it. The only bad question is one that has already been answered. • The Midterm and Final exams are proctored (see the syllabus for information on arranging for a proctor). These will also be delivered online via Canvas. They will consist of questions very similar to those on the Quizzes. In fact, you may even see some of the very same questions! • Here is how the points add up for the class: 10 Labs (20 pts each, but we drop your lowest) - 45% (180 pts); 4 Quizzes (10 pts each) - 10% (40 pts); 2 Homeworks (20 pts each) - 10% (40 pts); Midterm Exam - 15% (60 pts); Final Exam - 20% (80 pts);Some Facts About our Ocean World… • The oceans cover 71% of Earth's surface. • Almost all (over 97%) of the water on Earth’s surface is in the oceans. • The oceans contain about 5 trillion tons of salts. If dried and spread evenly, that much salt would cover the entire planet to a depth of 45 m (148 ft). • The average depth of the oceans is about 4000 meters (~13,000 ft). The deepest spot in the oceans is the Mariana Trench at 11,022 m (almost 7 miles!) deep. The pressure at the bottom of the Mariana Trench is 8 tons per square inch (over 1000 times the pressure at Earth’s surface). That kind of pressure compresses anything with air in it. For example, sending a styrofoam wig-display head down deep in the ocean squeezes all of the air out of it and permanently shrinks it down to a much smaller size. In the image below, compare the regular-sized foam head on the left to the tiny head on the right. The head on the right used to be the same size as the head on the left, until I attached it to the outside of the Alvin submarine during one of our dives to the bottom of the North Pacific Ocean (~4000 m). That hurts! • Compared to the volume of the entire Earth, the volume of the oceans is insignificant. Their average depth (~4 km) is a tiny fraction of the Earth’s radius (~6400 km). The blue paper representing the ocean on a globe is proportionally thicker than the real ocean is on Earth. • Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii measures ~10,600 m tall from the ocean floor, making it the tallest mountain on Earth (surpassing even Mt. Everest, which is <9000 m tall).A few words about the metric system As you were reading the facts above you probably noticed that we will be