BIOL310 Global Change Biology Module Briefing 2018/2019

BIO 310 Global Change Biology 2019

MODULE LEADER AND LOCATION: Dr Mick Hanley PSQ A416 with Prof. Dave Bilton DYB 610; Prof. Jason Hall-Spencer PSQ A428 MODULE AIMS 1. to consider how global change affects organismal biology; including effects on growth, reproduction, phenology, and ecosystem interactions and processes; 2. to consider how global change affects species distribution via examples of paleo-historical changes, recent range-shifts, and predictive use of ‘climate envelope’ models, and; 3. to explore how the above inform conservation practice. ASSESSED LEARNING OUTCOMES On successful completion of the module, students will be able to: LO1 - Evidence independent understanding of the impact of climate change on organismal biology (including effects on growth, reproduction, phenology, and ecosystem interactions and processes). LO2 - Evaluate evidence for species distribution shifts linked to climate and the importance of ‘species distribution’ models in forecasting range shifts. LO3 - Synthesise contemporary research showing how climate change impacts upon our ability to plan conservation strategies into the coming century.

BIO 310 Global Change Biology 2019

INDICATIVE SYLLABUS CONTENT The first part of the course with Mick Hanley assesses the evidence linking anthropogenic emission of greenhouse gases with climate change, and then how elevated CO2 and a linked change in climate affects primary productivity and plant community assembly. After plants, we look at animal physiological and phenological responses. Jason Hall-Spencer will then discuss the process of Ocean Acidification while Dave Bilton completes the term’s activities with Pleistocene climate shifts and how associated organismal distributions help our understanding of present-day responses to anthropogenic climate change. Mick Hanley returns in the new term to finish the module by exploring how climate change is likely to affect the distribution of plants and animals over the next century, and look in detail at how predictions are made. Seminars introduce new ideas and reinforce those concepts introduced in lectures, highlighting possible avenues to explore in your reading, course assessment, and exam revision. TEACHING PROGRAMME Spring Term Session/Location Week / Day-Date / Time Lecturer Topic Lecture 1 Introduction to Module 27 / Monday 28th Jan/ 11:00-13:00 Hanley BGB 411 Patterns of Climate change Lecture 2 28 / Monday 4th Feb / 11:00-13:00 Hanley Primary Production BGB 411 Lecture 3 29 / Monday 11th Feb / 11:00-13:00 Hanley Plant Community responses BGB 411 Seminar 1 30 / Monday 18th Feb / 11:00-13:00 Hanley Plant/Herbivore Interactions BGB 411 Seminar 2 31 / Monday 25th Feb / 11:00-13:00 Hanley Micro-organism Interactions BGB 411 Lecture 4 32 / Monday 4th March / 11:00- Animal physiology and Exam Hanley BGB 411 13:00 Practice Lecture 5 33 / Monday 11th March / 11:00- Hall- Ocean Acidification BGB 411 13:00 Spencer Lecture 6 34 / Thursday 21st March / 09:00- Hanley Phenology I BGB 411 10:00 Lecture 7 34 / Friday 22nd March / 09:00-10:00 Hanley Phenology II BGB 411 Lecture 8 35 / Monday 25th March / 11:00- Bilton Pleistocene distributions I BGB 411 13:00 Guest Lecture 35 / Thursday 28rd March / 10:00- Range shifts and Parmesan BGB 411 12:00 conservation Lecture 9 36 / Monday 1st April / 11:00–13:00 Bilton Pleistocene distributions II BGB 411

BIO 310 Global Change Biology 2019

Summer Term Session /Location Week / Day-Date / Time Lecturer Topic Seminar 3 Conservation in a climate- 40/ Monday 29th April / 11:00-13:00 Hanley Plymouth LT change world Lecture 10 40 / Thursday 2nd May / 09:00-10:00 Hanley Distributions I BGB 411 Lecture 11 40 / Friday 3rd May / 09:00-10:00 Hanley Distributions II BGB 411

Seminar 4 BGB 410 41 / Thursday 9th May / 13:00-15:00 Hanley Revision Session

Hanley/ Workshop 42 / Friday 17th May / 14:00-17:00 Bilton/ Hall- Poster Feedback DYB 209 Spencer Always check timetable for last- minute changes!

RECOMMENDED TEXTS & EXTRA READING Since climate change science is a rapidly evolving discipline, only recently have general texts become available – one you might look at is Post E (2013) Ecology of Climate Change - The Importance of Biotic Interactions. Princeton Press; it covers what it says and you’ll get it for under £40. Another option is Climate Change What the Science Tells Us published by Wiley, which covers greenhouse gases, oceanic and atmospheric processes, Pleistocene and Holocene paleo-climate, modelling climate, sea level rise, climate impacts on economic sectors, and extreme weather patterns associated with climate change. The bad news is that it costs £140 paperback (or better £33.50 as an e-book) and to be honest doesn’t cover as much of the biological responses as it might. However, there is a wealth of information in the primary literature (journal articles) and you will have no trouble accessing relevant and recent studies in journals such as Nature, Science, Global Change Biology, Ecology, PNAS, Conservation Biology and Biological Conservation. Indeed, throughout your final year at University you are expected to engage with the primary literature and show evidence of wider reading in your course work and exam assessments. You might need to brush up upon basic issues in ecology and conservation biology and many of you should already have used Groom, M.J., et al. 2006. Principles of Conservation Biology (Chapter 10; 3rd ed). Sinauer, Sunderland, Massachusetts. The module ‘reading workbook’ that accompanies material at the start of this module, should help you find your way.

BIO 310 Global Change Biology 2019

COURSE ASSESSMENT There will be one coursework assessment worth 50% of your final mark. The remaining 50% of module mark is the final exam in May. The exam will be comprised of two sections; Section A will require you to answer two long answer questions (worth 33% each) from a choice of three (from material covered by Hanley). Section B requires you to attempt both short answer questions (each worth 16.5%) set by Bilton & Hall-Spencer. The poster title is relatively broad-ranging, but the intention is that by the time you submit your work, the focus will be specific to a topic/scenario connected with one of: (a) the evolutionary adaptation of organisms to climate change (observed or likely); or (b) how we might use plants (or other organisms) to mitigate the effects of climate change; or (c) how we might actively assist species/communities to cope with climate-induced range shifts. There is no restriction on habitat-type – if you want to focus on marine species then do so as long as the species/system/scenario is relevant to topics (a)-(c). Assessment type Set date Hand in date Return date Poster – Biological adaptation to Week 40 – 12:00 Week 27 Week 42 Climate Change Tuesday 30th April

Please note that this is a hard copy hand-in to faculty office – the reason for this is that we run a poster feedback session in Week 42 that simply would not work if submissions were electronic. We appreciate also that the submission date is relatively late in the module, but our aim is to give you time to digest as many relevant concepts as possible and avoid clashes with other assessment deadlines. To help you, we provide below a couple of ‘starter’ references that should allow you to develop suitable themes: Hoffman AA & Sgro CM (2011) Climate change and evolutionary adaptation. Nature 470: 479–485. Thomas CD (2011) Translocation of species, climate change, and the end of trying to recreate past ecological communities. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 26: 216–221. Woodward IF et al (2009) Biological approaches to global environment change mitigation and remediation. Current Biology 19: R615–R623

Please note that if you are required to undertake either, or both of Referred Examinations or Coursework for this module, these take place in August of each year and will be your responsibility to ensure your availability. POSTER ASSESSMENT PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING GUIDANCE NOTES CAREFULLY Poster Teams - You will work in pairs (and NOT triples) – you can choose with whom, but I need to know by the 15th February who the pairs will be. From the 11th February, one person from each pair should e- mail me ([email protected]) the name of both partners. Anyone who is not in a pair after this time will be allocated a partner where possible based on a shared degree programme by the 22nd February and there will be no further changes.

BIO 310 Global Change Biology 2019

Given that no change in pair membership is allowed from February, it is important you make a good choice - obviously, you need to work well together to achieve the best results. We recognise, however, that very occasionally, issues arise. If you are having difficulties within your partner that you are unable to resolve amicably, please contact the module leader (Mick Hanley). We will ask you to sign an agreement of participation (i.e. who did what and how much on the poster) to be submitted with the assessment and we reserve the right to allocate marks according to your reporting and our perception of how much intellectual input you have each made to your poster. It is imperative therefore, that you highlight any issues well before hand-in. Poster Format – Posters (1 per pair) should be submitted as a printed copy to Faculty office (in colour, you can get this done in the library reasonably cheaply). Format the paper to size A2 (420 x 594 mm) - failure to adhere to this size limit will result in lost marks. The poster can be in either landscape or portrait orientation. You can use your own choice of font size and style but remember that clarity is important (references can be in font size 10 and we recommend you use a numbering system and in abbreviated form [but should retain enough information to allow us to find them], to save space). Remember that your poster needs a title, and make sure that your work can be identified via your University student numbers. Don’t leave printing until the last minute – there might be queues, technical errors etc., so allow plenty of time and ideally get a practice print done in advance of the deadline to check the formatting, for spelling and other simple mistakes, and that the lay-out works. Why Bother with Posters? - It is sometimes the case that students dismiss posters as an ‘easy option’, but designing a good science poster demands a great deal of time and consideration. The aim of the poster is to show that you have understood, and synthesised information relevant to topics covered in in the module, even if the main theme of the poster seems tangential. Not only is the ability to cross- synthesise apparently varying information a key skill for final year students, it is also fundamental for those of you wishing to develop any career in ecology or conservation. If none of that convinces you, many degree programmes in the School of Biological & Marine Sciences require you to do a poster for your final year projects and this is good practice. Poster Design and Content - Remember that your first job is to entice someone who is passing by to read your poster - so impact from some distance (circa 3m) is really important – use your imagination and play around with different options for colours, fonts (type, colour, size) and images. You need to balance impact with clarity and ease of reading (a colour scheme of fluorescent orange, yellow, and pink, might attract someone’s attention but for the wrong reasons). You should aim to maximise the impact of the content where you think appropriate (so you might use different fonts and effects [bold, underlining, etc.] to emphasise key points and headings), and make sure that the intended reading sequence of your poster is obvious. Content-wise, a good poster should have scientific depth and substance but should also communicate that clearly and concisely. It is difficult to distil what might be considerable amounts of complex ideas and data into a few sentences without losing quality and depth but this is part of the skill involved and what you should be aiming for. Long passages or ‘blocks’ of text should be avoided – there are ways of breaking this up by interspersing with figures, for example, or by using bullets (but do not over-use). Equally, you should think about what words you are using – are they all necessary to communicate your

BIO 310 Global Change Biology 2019 point? Often an efficient way of communicating patterns and/or data is by using a figure or table rather than text description. You can copy diagrams, figures etc. from published papers if you find appropriate examples that you think relevant to include, although remember to always properly reference your sources. Standard scientific conventions should, as always, be followed: Latin binomial species names in italic, figures and tables labelled and referred to in the text, references consistently formatted, and so on. Pay attention to these details, you will lose marks if you do not. For some further guidelines on putting posters together see Chapter 14 in Jones et al (2012) Practical skills in Biology (5th edition) and also look at Chapter 16 in the same book on how to write scientifically. A good website to look at is www.craftofscientificposters.com/. You might also have a look around the corridors and noticeboards of the Davy and Portland Square buildings to see some examples of ‘real’ scientific posters. Note that not all the posters you will see are necessarily good – it is good practice to consider how you might have improved upon them to help you with your own design. Learning outcomes and Marking criteria - Although the assessment is relatively free-ranging, each poster must align with at least one of the three key LOs (see Page 1 ASSESSED LEARNING OUTCOMES). Which of these you align with obviously depends on the topic of your poster; a more conservation orientated poster will inevitably align most closely with LO3 but in order to develop the story will need to consider one or all of LOs 1-3. Equally a poster on plant adaptation (LO1) could briefly consider impacts relevant to LOs 2&3. Half of the marks will be awarded for the scientific content of your poster (following the school’s generic marking criteria) with the other half for how well your content has been communicated (design and communication). Remember that failure to adhere to the prescribed format will inevitably lose you marks. In order for you to understand how the LOs and school generic marking criteria are applied to this assessment we provide the poster feedback sheet to you ahead of submission. This sheet is tailored to match and explain the four generic criteria of Content, Evaluation & Understanding, Use of Literature, and Presentation with which you should all be familiar. Feedback - This starts with your careful consideration of the instructions and marking criteria given above. Think of these as pre-submission feedback (the trendy term for this is feed forward) as they are the criteria upon which your work will be judged and it is your job to make sure that you meet them if you want to get a good grade. There will be a poster session in May where we provide feedback that will be both generic (outlining commonality of good and bad issues) and individual (written on the poster feedback sheet and time-permitting, communicated by a member of staff).

Health Warning! - Be clear that there is a difference between good feedback on poor work and poor feedback. Just because you didn’t ‘get’ the assignment and got a lower mark than you thought your efforts deserved, doesn’t mean that you received bad feedback. Our feed-forward, feed-back comments, in tandem with the marking criteria show you exactly why and where you lost or gained marks. A copy of the poster feedback sheet we will use to assess your work is given below:

BIO 310 Global Change Biology 2019

Criteria (% contribution to final mark) Grade Comments

ONTENT C (20%): + 70% Very well structured poster; all required facts incorporated and focussed on the question. No irrelevant material > logical order/ structure of the 60 - 69% Well-structured poster; most required facts incorporated and information focussed on the question with no/few significant errors. 50 - 59% Reasonable structure; a fair proportion of relevant facts, mostly > links/comparisons focussed on the question, some mistakes/irrelevant material between associated material 40 - 49% Limited coverage of required material with significant errors and/or irrelevant material. > supporting 30 - 39% Significant omission of information, and/or inclusion of substantially statements with incorrect/irrelevant material evidence and examples < 29% (Almost) no relevant material included; significant errors apparent Comments

EVALUATION, Excellent evaluation, synthesis and understanding; clear evidence of + 70% ORIGINALITY, & valid independent analysis UNDERSTANDING (20%): Good evaluation, synthesis and understanding; some substantially 60 - 69% > original correct independent analysis Some understanding apparent, but limited evaluation and synthesis; presentation of 50 - 59% material lacks effective independent analysis Limited evaluation, synthesis and understanding; little individuality 40 - 49% > proposing own demonstrated views/ theories/ Severe lack of understanding; inadequate independent evaluation and explanations 30 - 39% synthesis demonstrated. > making connections (Almost) no understanding, evaluation or synthesis demonstrated, < 29% with other subjects (total) lack of independent thought. >Comments critical evaluation

BIO 310 Global Change Biology 2019

Criteria (with % contribution to final mark) Grade Comments

A wide range of primary literature sources used, including novel + 70% USE OF LITERATURE (10%): examples; well incorporated into developing arguments Arguments supported by a range of primary literature sources > using primary 60 - 69% literature to support effectively incorporated into text; correct referencing style applied arguments Evidence of some primary literature, but ineffectively incorporated; 50 - 59% references often incorrectly cited > appropriate reference Arguments supported with anecdotal examples, inadequate to sources in text 40 - 49% reference to primary literature, references incorrectly cited > appropriate Arguments supported with anecdotal examples; no clear evidence of 30 - 39% formatting of relevant background reading. references No, or totally inadequate, reference to primary literature, or other < 29% sources of information. Comments

Excellent layout, and use of space, text, colour. Logical flow between + 70% sections. Concise, informative title. Exceptional use of supporting Figures and Tables (properly labelled and well integrated) PRESENTATION (50%): Good layout, use of space, text, and colour. Logical flow between 60 - 69% sections with appropriate title. Good use of supporting Figures and Tables (properly labelled and well integrated) > Design and formatting (In)Adequate layout, use of space, text, colour. Illogical flow 50 - 59% between sections; vague, uninformative title. Cramped / small text. > use of English, (In)Adequate / inappropriate use of supporting Figs & Tables spelling, vocabulary, Poor design, use of space, text, colour. Illogical flow; vague, grammar 40 - 49% uninformative title. Cramped / small text. Limited/no use of Figures > appropriate use of & Tables &/or poorly labelled and/or integrated into text Figures & Tables Very poorly formatted; Cramped or small text. No use of Figures and 30 - 39% Tables. Badly written.

< 29% Exceptionally poor formatting and layout, poor quality of English; no use of Figures and Tables Comments

Overall Grade :

BIO 310 Global Change Biology 2019

Please note: Contact hours in the Faculty of Science and Engineering will vary according to discipline and stage. Nationally accepted guidelines (see SEEC and QAA) highlight: “The amount of learning indicated by a credit value is based on an estimate using the idea of notional hours of learning. The number of notional hours of learning provides a rough guide to how long it will take a typical student, on average, to achieve the learning outcomes (what you will know, understand and be able to do having successfully completed the learning) specified for the module or programme”. The estimate of notional hours of learning doesn't just include formal classes, but estimates the amount of time spent in preparation for these classes, along with private or independent reading and study, plus revision and the completion of course-work required on the module. Within the UK, one credit represents 10 notional hours of learning and therefore a 20 credit module involves 200 hours of work. How this workload is spread will vary between disciplines, stages of programme, and associated teaching & learning strategies. As a broad guideline in this Faculty, you can typically expect 12-18 contact hours per week for each of the two semesters. As stated, these figures are only guidelines and are not definitive; the latest Key Information Set (KIS) data regarding the proportion of time spent in various learning activities on your programme can normally be accessed via the Unistats link: http://unistats.direct.gov.uk/

SUMMARY OF TEACHING AND LEARNING for BIOL 310 Scheduled Activities Hours Comments/Additional Information Lectures 20 Direct ‘Contact’ hours Seminars 8 Student Prep for Seminars 32 Student-led reading/research 110 Independent Study Student Coursework 30 Total 200