Scientific Diving Course at the University of Stuttgart

STARESO (STAtion de Recherches Sous-marines et Océanographiques) is a scientific station dedicated to marine research. It is located in Calvi Bay on the North-Western coast of Corsica (France) in the Mediterranean Sea. In 2016, the station hosted the annual scientific diving training course of the CDC GER/S01 WiTUS (Scientific diving group University of Stuttgart).

Together with the students, Prof. Dr. Franz Brümmer and Dipl.-Geol. Ralph-Walter Müller from the CDC GER/S01 WiTUS University Stuttgart launched an experiment to investigate the degradability of different plastic types in different marine habitats.

Therefore, the students had to prepare an experimental plan and organised all the equipment necessary. In the shallow waters close to the harbour of STARESO they selected different locations to expose the plastic samples. The exact positions were measured with an underwater GPS by using an underwater tablet computer in combination with a surface buoy. To install the plastic samples in the sandy substrate or on hard bottom (rocks) various scientific diving equipment was used, such as air lifts, a drilling machine and different sized lifting bags.  Additionally, an underwater documentation was performed through underwater photography in order to record the biodiversity of the certain experimental places and subsequently protocols.

This year’s scientific diving training was a University excursion within the scope of a defined project and, until now, very successful. All the different plastic type samples were installed in selected habitats and we are looking forward to learning more on the degradability process in the coming year.

On top of that, we congratulate Christin Müller and Alexander Ramm to their successful scientific diving examination, as CMAS scientific diving instructor and scientific diver, respectively.