GEOL 3030 meets the UGA environmental literacy requirement. See our GEOL 3030 course description page for a description of the course, its requirements, its scope, its target population, etc.. That page is intended for students interested in taking the course.
This page provides day-to-day course information as needed and links to websites useful to the course.
This page was last updated on Wednesday April 20, 2022 to add news about Exam II.
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A key for 2021 Exam II is available below.
Exam 1 has been graded. A histogram of the grades is shown below. The exam was similar to one given in a previous year, and the histogram for that exam is shown too.
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Old news:
The schedule of events for the next two weeks will be as follows:
Tuesday February 8: Exercise 3 distributed
Thursday February 10: Exercise 2 due (extended from original due date)
Tuesday February 15: Exercise 3 due
Thursday February 17: Exercise 3 returned and discussed
Tuesday February 22: Exam 1
Exercise 1 has been distributed in class and is due on Tuesday, February 1, 2022.
Copies of the 2021 GEOL 3030 exams are now linked below.
The syllabus for Spring 2022 is now available. The first meeting of GEOL 3030 is scheduled for Tuesday 11 December 2022 at 8:00 am. That meeting will involve a brief presentation of the syllabus, but most of the period will cover lecture material about oceanography and thus get the business of the course underway. The lecture that morning will be recorded (history suggests "poorly recorded" may be more accurate) and the recorded .pptx presentation will be available from the course's eLC Content folder.
Old news from 2021: The final exam has been graded. The distribution of recorded scores is shown below.
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Exam 2 has been graded and will be or was handed back on Monday 19 April 2021. The distribution of recorded scores is shown below.
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Exam 1 has been graded and will be or was handed back on Friday 5 March 2021 after its Covid quarantine. The distribution of recorded scores is shown below.
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Railsback's copy of the 12th edition of Essentials of Oceanography is on reserve at the Science Library Reserves Desk under the call number SPC R152 eo.
Answers to questions recently or frequently asked about GEOL 3030. Supplememtary reading about ocean circulation. The first four pages (pp. 47-50) are the main reason for providing this reading for those students wanting a broader and more modern view of ocean circulation. The "WOCE" to which the author refers is the World Ocean Circulation Experiment, a huge data-collection effort in the 1990s that was the subject of the entire book from which the reading is taken. The eWOCE Gallery at which you can view many profiles of temperature, salinity, O2, PO4, SiO2, and NO3 through the oceans. These summarize data collected by WOCE, the World Ocean Circulation Experiment, and are the most up-to-date picture of ocean circulation. GEOL 3030 exams from Spring 2021: Report on the Scientific Results of the Voyage of H.M.S. Challenger during the years 1872-1876: A Summary of the Scientific Results: First Part . A colorized map of the Tharpic Ocean An explanation of bathymetric maps for Exercise 1. The map of seafloor ages for Exercise 2. Everything that you need for Exercise 3 on Ocean Circulation should be in your lecture notes. First considerations for getting started on the Tsunami Travel Time exercise (Exercise 4). Help finding locations on the map for the Georgia Tides exercise (Exercise 5). Supplementary instructions about plotting data in the Marine Biology exercise (Exercise 6). Suggestions for the Planet Xornam exercise (Exercise 7). Suggestions for the (old) Marine Sediments exercise (Exercise 8). Suggested readings on marine geology: Plate tectonics and earth dynamics Assigned readings on physical oceanography: Why density of seawater increases with salinity Suggested readings on physical oceanography:Links to GEOL 3030 web pages:
Essay questions for the GEOL 3030 final exam.
Exam I
Exam II
Exam II key
Exam III (the final exam)GEOL 3030 exercise material:
Report on the Scientific Results of the Voyage of H.M.S. Challenger during the years 1872-1876: A Summary of the Scientific Results: Second Part.
An explanation of bathymetric profiles for Exercise 1.
Supplementary instructions about measuring spreading rate for the Plate Tectonics exercise (Exercise 2).
Help with Part 2 of Exercise 2.
More thoughts on the heart of the Tsunami Travel Time exercise.
Possible use of a spreadsheet for the Tsunami Travel Time exercise.
An Excel spreadsheet for people who have never used a spreadsheet. (a download)
Suggestions regarding the questions for the Georgia Tides exercise.
A suggestion for Question 2 of Part 1 of the Marine Biology exercise.
A color map of Planet Xornama.Web-based Readings (in addition to readings in the textbook indicated on the syllabus)
Plate tectonic boundaries
Plate tectonics and sinking of cooled oceanic lithosphere
(now included in the illustration of boundaries above)
Subduction and rollback
Rollback and mantle flow
Origins of Magmas I
Mid-ocean ridges
Mid-ocean ridges and their hydrothermal systems, Part I
Mid-ocean ridges and their hydrothermal systems, Part 2
The traditional hot-spot / mantle-plume model
the last three of which are part of the Dynamic Plate Tectonics website
Oceanic volcanic features: an Euler diagram
Aseismic ridges vs. chains of ocean islands and/or seamounts
Density of seawater at the sea surface
Variation of atmospheric pressure between and within climatic belts
The Trade Winds and Westerlies wind belts
Gyres of currents
The surface currents of the oceans I: a very simple map
The surface currents of the oceans II: a less simple map
The surface currents of the oceans III: NASA imagery
The surface currents of the oceans IV: seasonal countercurrents in the eastern Pacific and Atlantic
The surface currents of the oceans V: the Atlantic Conspiracy
The surface currents of the oceans VI: the Atlantic Conspiracy enlarged
NASA animations of surface circulation
The Ekman spiral, dynamic topography, and geostrophic currents
The Ekman spiral, dynamic topography, and coastal and equatorial upwelling
Gyres of currents, and eddies
Some origins of eddies in the (northern hemisphere) oceans
Cold-core rings and warm-core rings
Gyres of currents, idealized and eddified
The thermocline
The thermocline and deep circulation of the Atlantic - schematic
The thermocline and deep circulation of the Atlantic - less schematic
Expressions for the deep circulation of the oceans
Upwelling at divergences of ocean circulation
Two styles of upwelling in the Southern Ocean
Two models of deep ocean circulation
Models of deep ocean circulation in the 2010s ENSO (El Niño) events
Shallow-water waves and deep-water waves
An illustration about the "Caribbean Distillery".
The interaction of ocean currents, tides, and waves.
An explanation of the interaction of ocean currents, tides, and waves.
The spring-neap monthly tidal cycle.
A map of the tides of Earth's oceans.
A modified map of the tides of Earth's oceans.
Two optional documents linking the sections above:
A table showing the conceptual linkage of atmospheric circulation, ocean circulation, and plate tectonics.
A diagram showing the conceptual linkage of atmospheric circulation, ocean circulation, and plate tectonics.
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Assigned readings on biological oceanography:
Cycling of nitrogen as a nutrient
Cycling of phosphorous as a nutrient
Cycling of silicon as a nutrient
Cycling of iron as a nutrient
Iron as a limiting nutrient in the ocean
Mid-ocean ridges and their hydrothermal systems, Part 2
Annual ecological cycles - Part 1
Annual ecological cycles - Part 2
Suggested readings on biological oceanography:
Plankton Flashcards, a learning tool regarding marine planktic organisms
A table on marine mammals
Photosynthetic and chemosynthetic marine ecosystems:
the sea surface, hydrothermal vents, and cold seeps
Assigned readings on chemical oceanography:
The twenty-four most abundant solutes in seawater
Variation in concentration of solutes in the oceans I: Nutrients (nitrate, phosphate, silica)
Variation in concentration of solutes in the oceans Ia: Nutrients and biological productivity
Variation in concentration of solutes in the oceans II: Dissolved oxygen (O2)
Variation in concentration of solutes in the oceans III: Carbon dioxide (CO2)
Variation in concentration of solutes in the oceans IIIa: Carbon dioxide and the carbonate compensation depth (CCD)
Variation in concentration of solutes in the oceans IV: Oxidation of sinking organic particles - a summary
Variation in concentration of solutes in the oceans V: Scavenged ions
Variation in concentration of solutes in the oceans VI: The conservative solutes
A PDF file of the lecture overhead showing how residence times are calculated.
Concentrations and residence times of solutes in seawater
The four-box model of the oceans presented in lecture
The seven-box model of the oceans presented in lecture
Assigned readings for the "Three Weird Seas" lecture:
What's an ocean, and how many does Earth have?
Size and salinity of lakes, and the ocean(s) I
Size and salinity of lakes, and the ocean(s) II
The Black Sea I: Geography
The Black Sea II: A schematic cross-section
The Black Sea IIIa: Variation with depth
The Black Sea IIIb: Chemical variation with depth
Suggested reading on marine sediments:
The path from deep-sea sediments to paleoclimate records.
Assigned readings on paleoceanography:
a PDF file of a timeline of ocean history - not a reading from which exam questions will be drawn.
Possible causes of sea-level change
The path from deep-sea sediments to paleoclimate records
Oxygen Isotopes - not a reading from which exam questions will be drawn,
but a reading that will make more sense of the next item.
Oxygen isotope records of Cenozoic global cooling and glaciation
The Warm Saline Deep Water hypothesis
a PDF file of three detailed timelines
a Phanerozoic paleoenvironmental timeline
A diagram important in our lecture(s) on "Paleoceanography and the Future".
Suggested readings on paleoceanography:
Milankovitch cycles I: eccentricity
Milankovitch cycles II: tilt
Milankovitch cycles III: precession
To the GEOL 3030 course description page.
To Railsback's main page.
To The UGA Geology Department main page.
email to Bruce Railsback