GEO-8136 Practical geochronological methods in marine, terrestrial Quaternary Geology and geohazards - 10 stp

The course is recommended for students in Marine Geology and Geophysics, Sedimentology, Geohazards and Quaternary Geology.

PhD students at UiT The Arctic University of Norway register for the course through StudentWeb.

Within the scope of this course, students will get applied training in key geochronological methods to solve challenges for own studies with terrestrial and marine archives.

The course takes advantage of easy access from UiT to geohazards, glacial landscapes, and fjord sites around Tromsø. Students ability to choose sample locations, analyse and interpret geochronological data is the key to understand past interactions between the geohazards, Earth system and climate change. The course starts with theoretical background and physical principles of key geochronological methods and fieldwork will provide hands-on experience in sampling strategies and techniques.

Key methods that will be discussed are radiocarbon dating, optically stimulated luminescence dating, cosmogenic nuclide dating, and tephrochronology. Lectures, seminars and exercises will alternate to provide background information for current challenges and avenues of dating methods in high latitude environments and in geohazard studies.

With laboratory exercises and data analyses, students will focus on practical challenges of the dating techniques, like building age-depth models and evaluation of uncertainties. In seminars, student groups will critically assess published case studies with regard to age constraints, interpretations and related challenges.  

Knowledge

Upon completing the course, the students will:

• Have a comprehensive understanding of geochronological dating methods: radiocarbon, optically stimulated luminescence dating, cosmogenic nuclide dating, tephrochronology
• Be able to plan a sampling strategy for a marine or terrestrial research question in the field
• Have a good knowledge of inherited problems, challenges and potentials of the geochronological methods
• Be able to critically analyse and graphically present geochronological data in the light of a given research question
• Demonstrate advanced knowledge of and ability to explain different age-depth models and their (dis-)advantages, compare them and place these into a large-scale context
• Formulate the potential and limitation of each method and data sources
• Analyse information from databases, primary research articles and scientific reports

Skills

Upon completing the course, the students can:

• Create a number of standard statistical procedures and to analyse, to report and to discuss the results of data experiments
• Compose data with Excel, Past, Matlab or comparable software
• Build calibrated radiocarbon age-depth models with OxCal/Calib, Bacon
• Calculate luminescence and cosmogenic nuclide dating results
• Identify crypto-/tephra layers and their potential age
• Examine internet and databases as a resource for scientific information
• Work in groups to solve problems related to geochronology and own studies
• Report findings and to formulate scholarly arguments when delivering oral/poster presentations, reporting scientific finds and presenting data

Competence

Upon completing the course, the students will be able to:

• Master the most important elements of geological research projects: penetrating literature, carrying out field research, analysing data and communicating results to fellow students/scientists
• Critically evaluate and judge the quality of data and conclusions presented in primary databases, research articles and scientific reports
• Critically evaluate and judge the quality of data and conclusions obtained and presented in the group projects
• Write a research project on a given topic by presenting and justifying own results in the light of published studies
• Have independent as well as team-work skills

Method: Percentage of final grade. Poster presentation of data analysis 25%: PhD students individual poster presentations.

Written report including poster/oral presentation: 75%:PhD students prepare an individual oral presentation. Their reports need to elaborate on justification/discussion of own results in the light of published studies and methodological uncertainties.

All assessments must be passed in order to pass the course.