The South Dakota School of Mines and Technology's Black Hills Natural Science Field Station and Institute of Atmospheric Sciences, in cooperation with Anna University in Chennai India, offered an environmental science/geology field course early this summer exploring coastal environmental issues in India.
Dr. P.V. Sundareshwar, assistant professor, atmospheric sciences and director of the Biogeochemistry Core Facility at the School of Mines, led the group. Seven United States undergraduate students, five from Harvard University, one from Vassar College and one from Eckerd College, participated in an Indo-US Summer School on Coastal Environment.
The camp provided students and participants with an intense three-week training in coastal ecological issues including groundwater studies, mangrove ecology, and coastal and ocean biogeochemistry. It also integrated hard rock geology and a comparative study of tsunami-impacted and unimpacted coastal ecosystems in the Andaman Islands off the coast of India.
The Andaman Islands, which are mostly uninhabited, are very close to the epicenter of the earthquake that triggered the devastating Tsunami in December 2004. Students were able to observe, in a pristine island environment, the effects of and natural recovery response to a major natural disturbance. Locals on inhabited islands were amazed by the shock absorbing effect of the mangrove forests along the coast. They bore the brunt of the tsunami and some patches were completely devastated but they protected the forests and people behind them. Some of the mangroves and corals, which were basically pulverized, are now starting to regrow. Beautiful sponge corals, which were covered with sediment, are spawning bright colored polyps.
The students gained unique research experience in ocean biogeochemistry as part of the Indian Ocean research cruise aboard the Ocean Research Vessel - Sagar Nidhi. The Indian government, particularly the National Institute of Ocean Technology, strongly supported the activities by allowing the use of this newly commissioned state-of-the-art ocean research vessel and facilities to conduct a 10-day research cruise of the Indian Ocean. They contributed more than $1 million by providing the team access to this new vessel at operational costs of nearly $115,000 per day. They were also instrumental in obtaining special permission for the students, foreign nationals, to be onboard the vessel which is restricted by Indian government regulations.
The students worked with students and researchers from premier Indian research institutions, assisting in collection of samples from the Indian Ocean some of which are being analyzed at Columbia University in the US. Dr. Sundareshwar is already developing a research project on nutrient dynamics and ecology of mangrove ecosystems in the Andaman Islands in collaboration with Dr. R. Ramesh from the Institute for Ocean Management at Anna University. The preliminary data collected on this voyage could lead to more collaboration between the School of Mines and Anna University in India.
This field camp was made possible by connections Dr. Sundareshwar has made while working on INDOFLUX in India. INDOFLUX is an integrated environmental monitoring network of the terrestrial, coastal and oceanic environments across India which is being used to help understand the causes and consequences of global environmental change.
