Equipment

The department has a well-equipped sedimentological laboratory, with a settling tube linked to a Sedigraph for grain size analysis. It maintains two pneumatic vessels for coastal research and a variety of surveying tools, including a Model 808 Self Recording Electromagnetic Current Meter, a tide gauge and a benthic lander (RUNTI), Recording Current Meter RCM 9 Mk II, an Optical Backscatter Sensor (OBS-3 Sensor from D & A Instrument Compagny), an Acoustic Doppler Currentmeter : SonarLite (a single beam echo sounder) and an Automatic Level (BTA 4024 from salmoiragh istrumenti).

Calibration of the OBS is undertaken in house with a small recirculating tank, a matlab programme has been developed to enable the group to easily evaluate and plot the data obtained from any RUNTI or SLOT deployment within a matter of minutes on site, while the echo sounder has its own software Sonar2000 with sophisticated functions for download, editing and filtering data directly from the SonarLite device