Haifa

Location: Haifa, Israel
Associated University: University of Haifa
Program Dates: January 2020

About the Leon H. Charney School of Marine Sciences:

The Mediterranean Sea region is one of the world’s most sensitive and responsive regions to climate change and extreme climate effects due to human impacts and the increasing footprint of human-based activities in coastal areas. Biodiversity is threatened, and native species are rapidly declining due to offshore development such as gas exploration, extensive overfishing, agricultural and industrial pollution from excess nutrients and toxic substances, marine litter, degradation of critical habitats and a huge number of invasive or alien species. The Leon Charney School of Marine Sciences (University of Haifa), situated on the far-eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea focuses on this environment. The School is comprised of 4 Departments (Maritime Civilizations, Marine Biology, Marine Geosciences, and Marine Technologies), 32 academic faculty, ~50 administrative faculty, ~ 220 students and post-docs, and three international programs for MA and MSc degrees. Research at the school applies traditional and new technologies for a wide spectrum of multidisciplinary projects. Projects range from work in exciting underwater archaeological sites, rebuilding ancient ships, exploring the Mediterranean Sea (one of the most rapidly changing seas under climate change) from drones, remote sensing, advanced research-vessels, and cutting-edge, innovative, newly developed underwater technologies or biological applications. Our research sites include three field centers along the Mediterranean coastline as well as projects down south in the tropical coral reefs of the Red Sea Eilat. Mentors are affiliated with the four departments above (Projects could also be interdisciplinary with mentors associated to two departments). We welcome students to come and explore these exciting areas with us.

Following is a list of our academic faculty and their research interests.

To learn more, visit the host institute’s website: http://marsci.haifa.ac.il/index.php/en/:

Marine Biology

• Dan Tchernov works on long and short-term environmental changes that affect and modify complex biological systems on a multitude of levels, including coral bleaching, ocean acidification, deep coral physiology and the biology of blue fin tuna, sharks and rays in the Eastern Mediterranean Basin.
• Ilana Berman-Frank. Research interests focus on Marine N2-fixation; primary and bacterial production and carbon fate in the eastern Mediterranean Sea; ecophysiology and programmed cell death of the marine diazotroph - Trichodesmium; the impacts of desalination discharges on coastal microbial communities.
• Tali Mass focuses on coral physiology, coral bleaching, and biomineralization. Her lab focuses on basic mechanisms responsible for the precipitation of calcium carbonate in corals.
• Daniel Sher focuses on marine chemical ecology; the way aquatic organisms communicate through chemistry.
• Smadar Ben-Tabou de Leon works on sea urchins as classic models of development and gene regulation.
• Tamar Lotan, works on developmental marine biology and molecular ecology; specifically Cnidarian reproduction, proliferation, and early developmental pathways.
• Gil Rilov’s marine community ecology and conservation lab works on coastal benthic communities, mostly rocky shores, subtidal rocky reefs, and seagrass, as well as sea turtle and shark population ecology and conservation.
• Laura Steindler is a marine microbiologist and her work focuses on host-microbe interactions, cell-cell signaling, physiology, and molecular biology of marine bacteria and photoheterotrophy in marine bacteria.
• Michael David Krom. His research interests encompass aspects of present and past oceanography of the Eastern Mediterranean Sea with a focus on the importance of the marine P-cycle in the Mediterranean Sea.

Marine Geology, Geophysics and Geochemistry

• Michael Lazar works on tectonics of the Dead Sea, gas escape from the seafloor, submarine landslides, remote sensing, and shallow geophysical methods in the marine environment.
• Beverly Goodman’s research aims to reconstruct and resolve both long and short-term changes in marine and coastal systems to understand and better reconstruct the past and create reasonable expectations for the future.
• Boris Katsenelson focuses on wave propagation theory, ocean acoustics, and acoustical oceanography.
• Nicolas Waldmann’s group focuses on marine geology and geolimnology with application to paleoclimate and paleotectonism.
• Revital Bookman’s research is in the field of Quaternary and Environmental Geology with interests in marine and lacustrine sedimentology, paleoceanography and paleoclimate, and sediment mass transport processes connected to geo-hazards.
• Regina Katsman works on natural gas migration in aquatic sediments and localized volume reduction patterns in rocks.
• Uri Schattner’s interests span the fields of tectonics, seismic stratigraphy, Earth systems, marine geophysics, structural geology, gravity, magnetics, and sea floor morphology.
• Yizhaq Makovsky works on active seafloor processes and their potential geohazards and resources; multi-attribute 2D & 3D seismic methods in offshore exploration.
• Barak Herut is a marine chemist working on nutrient dynamics and air-sea interaction with a focus on the Eastern Mediterranean Basin.
• Gideon Tibor works on quantitative basin analysis of the Late Tertiary Levant passive continental margin and its implications to the understanding of the Messinian event.
• Yoav Lehan’s group works to understand the role of ocean circulation in controlling marine systems and regulating key interactions between their components.

Maritime Civilizations

• Gil Gambash works on ancient Mediterranean empires, particularly about aspects of maritime connectivity, mobility, and logistics.
• Assaf Yasur-Landau’s main research interests are the ties between the Aegean and the Levant, maritime trade, coastal survey, and Canaanite and Phoenician culture.
• Deborah Cvikel concentrates on shipwrecks and shipbuilding of the Ottoman period.
• Dror Angel focuses on the interactions between man and the marine environment, and in finding practical and sustainable solutions to problems in the marine environment.
• Hassan Khalilieh is a specialist in medieval maritime law in the Mediterranean.
• Ruth Shahack-Gross's main interest is in understanding natural and anthropogenic processes that result in the formation of archaeological sites.
• Professor Sariel Shalev’s interdisciplinary work is a study of the archaeology of metals and metallurgy in ancient Israel and the Levant.
• Emmanuel Nantet interests are in the field of underwater archeology of Mediterranean ships.

Marine Technologies

• Yizhaq Makovsky works on active seafloor processes and their potential geohazards and resources; multi-attribute 2D & 3D seismic methods in offshore exploration.
• Tali Treibitz’s main interests are imaging, underwater sensing, oceanic engineering, computer vision, computational photography.
• Morel Groper's interests are in autonomous underwater vehicles: structure, general arrangement, maneuvering and dynamics, propulsion, obstacle avoidance, launching and retrieval. Unmanned surface vehicles: planing crafts, propulsion, motion assessment in waves, obstacle avoidance. Tribology in marine environment: water lubricated bearings, mechanical seals.
• Roee Diamant is active in the fields of underwater acoustic communication networks, underwater signal detection, object classification, underwater localization, and underwater navigation.

This program is supported by NSF grant #1831075, 2019-2021.