4 Heraklion-CRETACOSMOS, HCMR-GREECE Description of the infrastructure / Transnational Access in 2012

Description of the infrastructure The CRETACOSMOS facility is part of the Institute of Oceanography, based at Thalassocosmos which comprises the recently constructed (in 2002) facilities of the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research in Crete. Thalassocosmos is located at about 16 km east of Heraklion city, on the north coast of Crete. The facilities of HCMR in Crete (which comprise three more Institutes: Institute of Aquaculture, Institute of Marine Biological Resources, Institute of Marine Biology and Genetics and also an Aquarium and two research vessels) offer an ensemble of complementary installations that allow experimentation at the unique Eastern Mediterranean environment known for its characteristics of extreme oligotrophy and P-limited productivity. The mesocosm facilities allow experimentation at the ecosystem level. The mesocosms (6 polyethylene bags up to 5 m3) are incubated in a large land based tank (300 m3) with running water allowing temperature control. The facility was used successfully during the Norwegian Research Counsel project NUTRITUNNEL in September 2009.

In addition to the mesocosm facility, there are also two research vessels (24 and 62 m long) and a zodiac as well as a variety of modern and fully equipped experimental laboratories for analytical and environmental work, in which the following is available:
• Different microscopes, inverted and epifluorescence
• Image analysis system
• Flow cytometer, several liquid N2 dewars, -80'C freezer
• Radio-isotope lab for 14C and 3H measurements
• Cooled centrifuge
• Culture laboratory fully equipped with autoclave, laminar flow, incubator, milliQ water, laboratory washer
• Constant temperature room
• Analytical balance, vortex, baths

Services currently offered by the infrastructure: The mesocosms, research laboratories and vessels will be fully accessible and will enable scientists to test hypotheses regarding the role of limiting factors on marine productivity in the Eastern Mediterranean which is of interest due to low productivity and P-limitation. Mesocosms are a valuable tool for these purposes since they do not present the technical and logistic difficulties of lagrangian experiments while at the same time they represent a community level approach in contrast to microcosm or laboratory experiments.
Besides the oceanographic and marine ecological research projects, mesocosm facilities in Crete (at the former facilities of the Institute of Marine Biology of Crete (IMBC), now part of HCMR) have been used by numerous (> 100) students from EU countries as part of their projects/theses at various levels (BSc, MSc, PhD). The facilities of HCMR in Crete have been used by several guest users in the framework of EU-funded and other collaborative research projects as well as by mobility students. It is expected that the Community funding will make these facilities more organized and more easily accessible and users will not have to depend on large-scale research projects only.
 

Transnational Access in 2012

Mesocosm experiment A: 1-31 May 2012     see CALENDAR 2012

ATMOMED - The impact of atmospheric deposition on the microbial food web of the Eastern Mediterranean Sea

The application deadline for MESOAQUA Transnational Access was 30 September 2011, 12:00 CET. The applications are currently in review process by the independent SAB.
 

Contact at HCMR:

Modality of access under MESOAQUA: Up to 12 persons for 30 days per year for three years will be allocated to external users. Users will have access to the mesocosm facility as well as to the full research laboratories of HCMR, described above. Projects of external users will be integrated in the existing schedule of the facility.

Support offered under MESOAQUA: The scientific equipment of HCMR (laboratories, instruments, research vessels) will be at the disposal of the potential users of the facility. In order to increase the scientific advancement and output of the TA activity visitors/groups (beyond a mere access to the facility) will get scientific support in terms of planning of the activity before arrival (typically initiated several moths before arrival) and hands on training by the MESOAQUA postdoc/early career scientist and the scientific team around the facility (learn more). The MESOAQUA postdoc/early career scientist will further assist the visitors with scientific supervision throughout the stay of the visitors. Computers, information technology support, a library with on-line access to all major scientific journals will also be available to guest users. An efficient administration mechanism is available as well. A dynamic scientific environment also exists at the HCMR research park in Heraklion (Thalassocosmos). Four Institutes are installed at Thalassocosmos, with 26 research scientists working on oceanography, aquaculture, fisheries, marine biology and genetics.

Read more about the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research (HCMR).