The Lehigh Aquatic Ecosystems Program offers a unique opportunity for graduate study. Our unusual array of resources and emphasis on cooperative research and education produces versatile graduates with marketable skills. Multidisciplinary research and the extensive use of environmental data sets enhance the graduate and undergraduate experience. Faculty work closely with their students to study lake ecosystems, plankton communities, bio-optics, climate history, sedimentation, aqueous geochemistry, and hydrology. Our courses emphasize hands-on learning through laboratory and field experiences. Our research utilizes the development and application of advanced instrumentation to study the abiotic and biotic factors regulating the structure and function of aquatic communities and ecosystems.Financial support is available for qualified students.

The EES Department offers courses at the graduate and advanced undergraduate levels in ecology, environmental science, and earth science. Of special interest to aquatic ecosystem students are advanced undergraduate courses in limnology, microbial ecology, paleoecology, aqueous geochemistry, environmental instrumentation and data analysis, and lake ecosystems. At the graduate level, aquatic ecosystem students will likely take two core courses (Aquatic Ecosystems; Paleoclimatology) plus courses related to the research interests of the core faculty (e.g. bio-optics, geological limnology, microbial ecology, community ecology).

A number of graduate students reside at the Lacawac Sanctuary during the summer to conduct their research and help to supervise undergraduate research interns. Other students spend the summer at distant research sites. Foci of participants include ecosystems in the northeastern and midwestern U.S., as well as Colorado, Alaska, and Argentina. Students and faculty from other institutions complement our own efforts at these sites and in the Poconos; we encourage collaboration.