INVERTEBRATE EMBRYOLOGY AND LARVAL BIOLOGY FOR REEF AQUARISTS -Taught by Ron Shimek

shiveley

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Course Announcement:
http://www.reefstewardshipfoundation.org/forums/showthread.php?p=15035#post15035

INVERTEBRATE EMBRYOLOGY AND LARVAL BIOLOGY FOR REEF AQUARISTS - Taught by Ron Shimek

Duration: 10 Weeks

Starting Date: 17 January, 2010

Required Enrollment:

For the course to proceed, I will need 10 enrolled (paid-up) students
by 10 January, 2010. Students may enroll by sending me an email at: ronshimek@wispwest.net, and by depositing $150 (Of this, $125 goes to me, $25 goes to The Reef Stewardship Foundation)
in my PayPal account. Should not enough people enroll by 10 January,
the registration fee, less any PayPal charges will be refunded. Once the course has started, no refunds will be issued.

Text:

Strathmann, M. F. 1987. Reproduction And Development Of Marine Invertebrates Of The Northern Pacific Coast. University of Washington Press. Seattle. 670 pp.

Available at Amazon.com. http://www.amazon.com/Reproduction-Development-Invertebrates-Northern-Pacific/dp/0295965231

Recommended Text/Reference:

Ruppert, E. E, R. S. Fox and R. D. Barnes. 2003. Invertebrate Zoology, A Functional Evolutionary Approach. 7th Ed. Brooks/Cole-Thomson Learning. Belmont, CA. xvii +963 pp.+ I1-I26pp.

This text will not be "œnecessary" for the course, but it will be REALLY helpful to have it.

Most of the course content will come from original text/lecture essays that I will write.

Optional (Desired) Equipment:

Digital camera (3.3 Megapixel or better) and ability to upload photos.

Microscopes"¦ If you have living animals or larvae, microscopes are a necessity. If you are just "œlearning," they are not.

Prerequisite or Necessary Background Knowledge:

College Introductory Biology or sufficient ability and desire to be able to go to references and find out terms.

Course Level:

The lectures for this course will written be at about the 2nd or 3rd
year level of college. I will assume you have the ability to read and
understand college level material. I am not going to "œdumb down" the
course material.

Course Format:

Every Monday, I will email the week's lecture/essay and optional
laboratory instructions to the students. This will involve up to 25
pages of material. We will have a private Reef Stewardship Foundation
forum. All students may upload and discuss questions on that forum. I
will typically check several times during the day to answer and address
questions. Each Friday, I will upload a short quiz. The answers to the
quiz will be uploaded the following Monday.

I estimate each week may have up to 50 pages of assigned readings. If
it has been a while since you have been in school"¦ this reading may be
difficult, it isn't like reading a novel. Board Image You will encounter a LOT of jargon terms. I will indicate some appropriate dictionaries and definition sources.

The laboratory exercises in the course will consist of observations
and/or experiments done in a standard reef tank. These exercises will
not harm any organisms in the tanks.

Course Coverage:

The course will discuss the reproduction and development of
invertebrates, in general, with an emphasis whenever possible upon
coral reef animals. However, relatively little specific work has been
done with coral reef invertebrates, so the student must expect a lot of
non-coral reef examples.

The fundamental question asked will be: "œHow does this animal (any
animal) go from adult to a juvenile capable of growing into an adult?"
or phrased a bit differently, "œHow does an adult recreate another
adult?"

The secondary question to be addressed will be: "œHow can I spawn and raise these animals?" I will detail some techniques and

We will cover all the invertebrates likely to be found in marine aquaria, and a few others besides.

Course Syllabus (Subject To Change As The Class Progresses)

Week 1 "“ Introduction; Materials, Methods, Course Rules, Definitions of Embryos, Larvae.

Spawning Preparation and Initiation. Techniques to study and prepare animals for spawning.

Week 2 - Spawning, Embryogenesis.

Week 3 - Early Larval Development; Lineage of Radiates and Deuterostomes (Cnidarians, Echinoderms, Chordates)

Week 4 - Later Larval Development; Lineage of Radiates and Deuterostomes (Cnidarians, Echinoderms, Chordates)

Week 5 "“ Metamorphosis and Settlement "“ Lineage of Radiates and Deuterostomes (Cnidarians, Echinoderms, Chordates)

Week 6 - Early Larval Development; Lineage of Lophotrochozoans (Annelids, Mollusks, Other Groups)

Week 7 "“ Later Larval Development; Lineage of Lophotrochozoans (Annelids, Mollusks, Other Groups)

Week 8 - Metamorphosis and Settlement - Lineage of Lophotrochozoans (Annelids, Mollusks, Other Groups)

Week 9- Early Larval Development of Arthropods

Week 10 "“ Later Larval Development of Arthropods, Including Settlement and Metamorphosis.

Instructor Qualifications

It is vital on courses such as this that the students are aware of the instructor's level of expertise:

I have taught marine-oriented invertebrate zoology courses at:

The University of Alaska, Anchorage.

Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre (Bamfield Marine Station prior to
2002), Bamfield, British Columbia, Canada. (Operated by a consortium of
western Canadian universities)

University of Washington Friday Harbor Laboratories, Friday Harbor, Washington.

University of Washington, Seattle, Washington.

Hatfield Marine Station, Oregon State University, Newport, Oregon.

Montana State University, Bozeman, Montana.

Additionally, I have done research into and using invertebrate larvae,
and have published several articles specifically dealing either
entirely or in part with invertebrate larvae and reproduction:

Shimek, R. L. 1981. Neptunea pribiloffensis (Dall 1919) and Tealia crassicornis (Müller, 1776), On a snail's use of babysitters. The Veliger. 24:62-66.

Shimek, R. L. 1983. Biology of the Northeastern Pacific Turridae. I. Ophiodermella. Malacologia. 23:281-312.

Shimek, R. L. 1983. Biology of the Northeastern Pacific Turridae. II. Oenopota. The Journal of Molluscan Studies. 49:149-163.

Shimek, R. L. 1983. The biology of the Northeastern Pacific Turridae. III. The habitat and diet of Kurtziella plumbea (Hinds 1843). The Veliger. 26:10-17.

Shimek, R. L. 1984. The biology of the Northeastern Pacific Turridae. IV. Shell morphology and sexual dimorphism in Aforia circinata (Dall, 1873). The Veliger. 26:258-263.

Shimek, R. L. 1986. The biology of the Northeastern Pacific Turridae.
V. Demersal Development, synchronous settlement and other aspects of
the larval biology of Oenopota levidensis. International Journal of Invertebrate Reproduction and Development. 10:313-337.

Shimek, R. L., D. Fyfe, L. Ramsey, A. Bergey, J. Elliott, and S. Guy.
1984. A note on the spawning of the north Pacific market squid Loligo opalescens (Berry 1911) in Barkley Sound, Vancouver Island, Canada. Fishery Bulletin. 82:445-446.

Anderson, R. A., and R. L. Shimek. 1994. Field observations of Rossia pacifica (Berry, 1911) egg masses. The Veliger. 37:117-119.

Additionally, I assisted in the compilation of data and techniques for
the standard reference on marine invertebrate reproduction; wherein I
am cited as a chapter advisor for Prosobranch gastropods and Asteroid
echinoderms:

Strathmann, M. F. 1987. Reproduction and development of marine invertebrates of the Northern Pacific coast. University of Washington Press. Seattle. 670 pp.

Finally, I have assisted in the research of several other scientists as
they addressed questions of larval biological importance. From this
assistance, I have learned many techniques and a lot of information
about such animals.

If you have any questions about the course, please either post them in this forum or contact me at the email address above.
 
It's an online class taught by Ron Shimek through the Reef Stewardship Foundation. It's not part of any other learning institute...
It's basically for personal and/or professional development, not college course credit. It's oriented toward people who are interested in captive propagation via the spawning and subsequent rearing of larval organisms. Considering his status in the field, it's kind of a big deal that he's making this available to the general public. Further information is available in the links provided in the original posting.
 
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