The Changing Arctic and Subarctic Environment (CASE): a european network on marine biotic indicators of recent climate changes in the Nordic seas and adjacent domains

The European Marie Curie Initial Training Network CASE (FP7 - ITN) is formalizing long-standing research collaborations in the field of empirical and simulated climate and oceanographic changes in the Nordic and Barents Seas. CASE offers an ideal setting for running integrated and innovative projects on recent (Holocene) Arctic and Subarctic climate changes and implementing a multidisciplinary and intersectorial training on biotic proxies of past marine environments through a Marie Curie Network. The EU-funded 12 CASE PhDs projects are concerned with the sensitivity of marine primary and secondary producers to changes in marine physical aspects, and the invaluable information on past oceanic and climatic conditions given by their fossil remains contained in sedimentary archives. Climate modelling provides complementary physical information. The investigations cover an extended field of disciplines, from micropaleontology, to organic and inorganic geochemistry, and an array of expertise such as taxonomy, molecular and stable isotope geochemistry, and climate modelling. This presentation will provide information on the structure of the consortium, the content and philosophy of the training actions, as well as the main scientific objectives of the various research projects carried out by the CASE partner institutions.