Facilities

The Ocean Studies department maintains a number of facilities devoted primarily to Ocean Studies majors.  On the waterfront, this includes the R/V Friendship, a 49 ft. research vessel equipped with side-scan sonar, a trawl winch, a science winch, an A frame, and an otter trawl. The OS department also maintains a waterfront wet lab equipped with a flow-through seawater system and laboratory space for senior research projects (Andrews Hall), biology and geology labs (Rodgers Hall), and chemistry labs (Dismukes Hall).

Ocean Studies students are introduced to a number of scientific instruments and equipment relevant to ocean analysis throughout their coursework. The department maintains or shares a growing inventory of such equipment, including conductivity-temperature-depth sensors (CTDs), rosettes, sediment corers and grabs, a remotely operated vehicle (ROV), and an acoustic Doppler current profiler (ADCP). For chemical and biological analysis, students have access to microscopes, UV-, visible-, and IR- spectrophotometers, a fluorometer, a gas chromatograph – tandem mass spectrometer (GC-MS/MS), a compound light microscope with fluorescence capacity, an inverted microscope with fluorescence, and -80 °C storage.

R/V Friendship

Andrews Hall, wet lab

Sediment corer

Rosette

Dismukes chemistry lab