Module 11: Human-Environment Interactions part of Future of Food
Steven Vanek, Pennsylvania State Univ-Penn St. Erie-Behrend Coll; Karl Zimmerer, Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus
Module 11 focuses on the way that human-environment interactions in food systems respond to stress. Food production systems and food systems in general face adversity and must have sources of resilience to overcome ...

Module 10: Food Systems part of Future of Food
Steven Vanek, Pennsylvania State Univ-Penn St. Erie-Behrend Coll; Karl Zimmerer, Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus
Module 10 continues the theme of human-environment interactions seen at a smaller scale with agroecosystems in Module 8, and develops the ideas of coupled human-natural systems (CHNS) begun at the beginning of the ...

Module 5: Soils and Nutrients part of Future of Food
Steven Vanek, Pennsylvania State Univ-Penn St. Erie-Behrend Coll
The purpose of this module is to give you as a learner a basic grounding in the nature of soils and soil nutrients. Module 5.1 provides the foundation for understanding soils, soil nutrients, and their connection ...

Unit 9: Carbon Cycle and Ocean Chemistry part of Modeling Earth Systems
David Bice, Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus
In this module, students first review some background material on the terrestrial, marine, and anthropogenic processes involved in the storage and transfer of carbon in the Earth system. The students then build a ...

Summative Assessment: Creating a model part of Modeling Earth Systems
Kirsten Menking, Vassar College; Louisa Bradtmiller, Macalester College; David Bice, Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus
The summative assessment for this course requires students to construct, utilize, and critique a numerical model of a climate-related Earth system of their choosing. The project involves four pieces: creating a ...

Unit 10: Coupled Economic and Environmental Models part of Modeling Earth Systems
Louisa Bradtmiller, Macalester College
How do people treat commonly held resources? Ecologist Garrett Hardin suggested that, in the absence of any restrictions or incentives, rational people will tend to drastically overuse any common resource. In this ...

Unit 6: Hydrologic Balance and Climate Change part of Modeling Earth Systems
Kirsten Menking, Vassar College
In this unit, students create a STELLA model of the Owens River chain of lakes in eastern California and then experiment with different climate change scenarios to simulate the Pleistocene history of lake filling ...

Unit 8: Thermohaline Circulation part of Modeling Earth Systems
David Bice, Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus
In this module, students first review some background material on density-driven deep currents in the oceans, and then create a STELLA model of the thermohaline circulation in the North Atlantic Ocean. The model ...

Unit 3: Simple Climate Models part of Modeling Earth Systems
Louisa Bradtmiller, Macalester College
Students will explore Earth's radiation budget using several versions of a simple climate model often referred to as a "layer model." Earth receives energy from the sun, some of which is reflected ...

Unit 5: Growth and Decay of Ice Sheets part of Modeling Earth Systems
David Bice, Pennsylvania State University-Main Campus
Large continental ice sheets, such as the Laurentide Ice Sheet from the last glaciation, as well as Antarctica and Greenland of today, are some of the most important features of the global climate system — they ...