Picture1 : SDU Odense
I am in the first grade of my master’s course! I’m writing this blog to introduce my stay in Odense, Denmark. In this Spring vacation, I spent approx. 1 month at the University of Southern Denmark (SDU) to conduct research in cooperation with Dr. Kazumasa Oguri, Associate professor. Danish Center for Hadal Research (HADAL) and Nordcee, Dept. of Biology.
During my stay, I conducted oxygen imaging of the sediments. By using a special fluorescent dye that changes the phosphorescent intensity depending on the oxygen concentration, it is possible to visually grasp the oxygen concentration. We collected several sediment cores in a bay called "Kerteminde Fjord" near Odense, put the soil and benthic organisms contained in these cores into a small tank, and conducted experiments by reproducing the sedimentary environment. Refer to this paper for the method: Larsen, M., Borisov, S. M., Grunward, B., Klimant, I. and Glud, R. N. (2011) . A simple and inexpensive high resolution color ratiometric planar optode imaging approach: application to oxygen and pH sensing. Limnology and Oceanography: Methods, 9(9), 348-360. https://doi.org/10.4319/lom.2011.9.348
After taking a large number of photos at regular time intervals by imaging, I worked on animating the photos using MATLAB. Contrasting the before and after images help us to measure changes in organism movement and oxygen penetration in the sediment. I didn’t get used to programming, so it took me a while to understand the language specifications, but in the end, I was able to get the results I wanted.
In addition to my research, I travelled to various places in Denmark and neighbouring countries during my vacation. Please take a look at the photos!
