MTO 489 - Environmental Biophysics

Course Objectives

The climate and the environment interact. Therefore, the effects of meteorological factors on the environment need to be better understood. The aim of this course is to describe the organisms and their relationships with the physical microenvironment. Thus, physical principles of interaction between meteorological factors and environment will be introduced. Students interested in these topics will be able to better understand and analyze the interaction between atmospheric factors and microenvironment of organisms. The course will cover how thermodynamic laws can be used to explain and identify changes in the microenvironment.

Course Description

Introduction: Microenvironment, Energy exchange, Mass and Momentum transfer; Temperature: Typical variation of atmospheric and soil temperatures, Temperature and biological development, Thermal time, Thermal time and interaction with other environmental variables; Water vapor and other gases; Organisms and their surrounding water; Wind: Wind above and within vegetation; Heat and Mass Transfer; Conductivity of heat and mass transfer of vegetation; Soil conduction and factors affecting it; Movement of water in soil; Radiation fluxes in natural environment; Animals and their microenvironment; People and their environment; Plants and plant communities; Plant Micrometeorology; Carbon dioxide fluxes in terrestrial ecosystem and measurement of these fluxes