Núria Casacuberta Arola: Catalogue data in Autumn Semester 2020 |
| Name | Prof. Dr. Núria Casacuberta Arola |
| Name variants | Núria Casacuberta Nuria Casacuberta Nuria Casacuberta Arola Núria Casacuberta Arola |
| Field | Physical Oceanography |
| Address | Physikalische Ozeanographie ETH Zürich, CHN E 19.2 Universitätstrasse 16 8092 Zürich SWITZERLAND |
| Telephone | +41 44 632 83 36 |
| nuria.casacubertaarola@usys.ethz.ch | |
| Department | Earth and Planetary Sciences |
| Relationship | Assistant Professor |
| Number | Title | ECTS | Hours | Lecturers | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 651-4191-00L | Radionuclides as Environmental Tracers | 3 credits | 2V | M. Christl, N. Casacuberta Arola, L. Wacker, C. Welte | |
| Abstract | Radionuclides stemming from natural and artificial sources are powerful tools that allow gaining a better understanding of a large range of environmental processes. This course will focus on cosmogenic and anthropogenic radionuclides and will provide a general overview about common applications and the use of tracers in the environment, e.g. to understand past climatic changes and ocean currents. | ||||
| Learning objective | Students learn the basic facts about sources and fate of natural and artificial long-lived radionuclides (e.g. 14C, 26Al, 10Be, 129I 236U, Pu-isotopes, etc.). They gain insights into the different detection techniques, with special focus on accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS). A selection of the numerous applications of the different radionuclides in oceanic, atmospheric and terrestrial processes will be studied. | ||||
| Content | The course will include lectures, practical exercises and two excursions, namely the opportunity to visit the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL) and the AMS facilities at ETH (Laboratory of Ion Beam Physics). Lectures will cover: - an introduction to natural and artificial radionuclides; - a general overview of radionuclide detection, in particular AMS will be studied including a tour to the Laboratory of Ion Beam Physics; - applications of long-lived radionuclides in the different environmental compartments (oceans, atmosphere and terrestrial environments): o The use of 14C in oceanic, atmospheric and terrestrial studies including a tour to the WSL labs; o applications of 10Be in ice cores and marine sediments; o applications of nuclear wastes from nuclear accidents (e.g. Fukushima); o controlled releases from nuclear reprocessing plants and their role in understanding oceanic processes. Exercise classes will include an introduction to the Ocean Data View and basic course in applying box models to describe transport and mixing processes. As an evaluation, students will have to hand in a series of exercises related to the different topics of the lecture. | ||||
| Prerequisites / Notice | The content of this course is interdisciplinary and it will benefit from students coming from different fields. Two lab tours are organized. This course is also well suited for Ph.D. students. Students will need to bring their own computer that allow installing Ocean Data View. | ||||