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Rohil Suryavarma Kunasegar from Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS under the supervision of Dr. Nor Syazwani binti Zainal Abidin from the Petroleum Geoscience department visited Universität Bremen, in Bremen, Germany from 18th to 30th September 2022. The objective of the visit was to initiate a knowledge transfer between UTP and Universität Bremen through a physical meeting with his external supervisor and relevant research institutes for his postgraduate research project along with developing teaching and learning materials for the ‘Physical Geology’ course which stood as the icebreaker for introducing the geoscience curriculum to undergraduate students.  

The kick-off meeting took place in the Willkommen im UFT which involved both the student and Professor Dr. Christian Wild, field supervisor. Prof. Christian Wild serves as the Head of the Department of Marine Ecology who specializes in ecology, marine biology and microbiology. The agenda of the meeting involved the preliminary introduction of the student, the presentation of his proposed research covering the motivation, proposed methodology and expected outcomes of the research. The student presented his proposed project focusing on the Cenozoic coral reefs of East Sabah, Malaysia emphasizing on carbonate sedimentology and palaeoecology which tied closely with Prof. Dr. Christian Wild’s experience with modern reef counterparts. After the meeting, Prof Dr. Christian Wild reviewed the presentation and provided some constructive feedback and recommendations along with a proposal to conduct a joint meeting with the main supervisor from UTP.  

 

Kick-Off Meeting between Rohil Suryavarma Kunasegar and Prof. Dr. Christian Wild at Willkommen im UFT 

The second day involved a private campus tour to selected research facilities within the campus which included the Leibniz-Zentrum fur Marine Tropenfoschung (ZMT), Fachbereich Geowissenchaften (FB5) and Staats-und Universitats bibliothek (SuUB). The purpose of the tour was to explore the available facilities of the research institutes to be potentially incorporated in the proposed research along with developing new teaching and learning materials for the selected course. After lunch, the Fachbereich Geowissenchaften (FB5) was first visited in the afternoon since it closely represented the focus of the current research and Physical Geology course. However, due to the semester planning of the University, numerous staff were away from office due to semester break and fieldwork. Therefore, several facilities were not available. Despite that, as an alternative, numerous images and videos of the publicly displayed geological samples and research were taken. The images were taken based on the applicability to the syllabus of the Physical Geology course, such as minerals, rock specimens, and fossils which tied to mineralogy, rock types and geologic time. 

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​Exterior View of the Facbrereich Geowissenchaften (FB5) and publicly displayed geological data (ichthyosaur fossil sample) 

The following days involved the continuation of research amendment and campus tours of the previously listed research facilities along with additional research facilities, namely the Department of Marine Ecology. The short tour was conducted by Svea, a Ph.D candidate under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Christian Wild to which the tour displayed the aquarium facilities and apparatus used in coral research along with the implementation on currently ongoing research on Cnidarians, namely soft corals and jellyfish.  

​Brief tour of Department of Marine Ecology aquarium facility 

Another research facility which warranted a short tour was the MARUM research facility. Despite the lack of staff, a brief tour was conducted involving the International Discovery Program (IODP) Bremen Core Repository (BCR). Core data details pertaining to the acquisition locations and core lengths were shared along with procedures in accessing the data for possible future research through a short discussion with Dr. Holger Kuhlmann, BCR Superintendent. 

 

Exterior View of MARUM Research Institute and International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) Bremen Core Repository 

A scheduled online meeting was agreed between the two institutes via Zoom which was attended by the student along with Dr. Nor Syazwani binti Zainal Abidin, Ts. Dr. Siti Nur Fathiyah Jamaluddin and Prof. Dr. Christian Wild. During the meeting, Prof. Christian provided comments composed of both concerns and suggestions to help improve the novelty of the study with possible future research collaborations discussed. Prof. Christian further recommended referring to Dr. Marleen Stuhr from the Leibniz fur Marine Tropenschung (ZMT) who specializes in Palaeoecology and Carbonate Sedimentology for further insights on the project. 

Online Meeting between Rohil Suryavarma Kunasegar, Dr. Nor Syazwani Binti Zainal Abidin, Ts. Dr. Siti Nur Fathiyah Jamaluddin, and Prof. Christian Wild 

Taking into account the comments provided by Prof. Christian, a short meeting between Dr. Steve Doo and Dr. Marleen was conducted after lunch along with the presence of several other postgraduate students under her supervision from the Biogeochemistry and Geology Division. The meeting involved the presentation of the amended research proposal to the team with the objective of obtaining feedback and suggestions from Dr. Marleen. Dr. Marleen expressed her concerns on the applicability of geochemical analysis on the fossils due to the impact of diagenetic alterations on the aragonitic skeletons of the fossils and instead, suggested to focus more on the fossil assemblage.  

 

Interior View of Leibniz fur Marine Tropenschung (ZMT) and meeting with Dr. Marleen Stuhr and Dr. Steve Doo (Biogeochemistry and Geology Division) 

Later, in the afternoon, a visit was conducted to the Max-Planck-Institut fur marine Mikrobiologie. The motive of the visit was to enhance the teaching and learning materials of the Physical Geology course. Similar to the other departments, a quick reconnaissance on the available case studies and specimens was conducted from which the materials will be selected based on its suitability to the course syllabus. After reviewing the specimens and case studies, additional live specimens of both hard and soft coral species were taken in the form of images and videos to be integrated in the carbonate rocks section of the course. In addition, several images of deep marine black smoker deposits were taken to be integrated in the mineralogy portion of the course.