MARIA S. MERIAN MSM106

This expedition is a training cruise as part of the curriculum of the international master program "Climate Change and Marine Sciences", which is currently implemented at the Atlantic Technical University of Cabo Verde (UTA) in the framework of the BMBF funded WASCAL program ("West African Science Service Centre on Climate Change and Adapted Land Use"). During the cruise, several modules of the curriculum will be taught theoretically as well as practically. In addition, scientists on board will be able to communicate their research to West African students and conduct joint master's thesis projects during the expedition, which will be jointly supervised by the respective scientist and a UTA professor. Therefore, current scientific topics and issues will be included in the work program of this expedition (e.g. mesoscale variability, pollution of the ocean by microplastics, time-series observations), in order to collect important data for the master theses to be written. The students will benefit, not only through the teaching component
Delivered by the lecturing PIs, but even more through their immersion into real individual research projects as compared to the more “staged” experience of classical field work practicals. Through the combination of teaching and research ("training-through-research"), the transit trip is an added value for international academic education as well as for current research projects in the region.