Interdisciplinary scientific education at the TU Bergakademie
Two-thirds of our planet is covered by oceans and therefore inaccessible to direct exploration. As a result, we know more about the surface of the moon or Mars than we do about the ocean floor of our own planet. The deep sea can only be explored using ROVs and AUVs. The shallow marine areas can be explored with reasonable effort by scientists diving with compressed air to a depth of approx. 40 m and, with the use of special breathing gas mixtures, to approx. 100 m.
In addition to their personal scientific expertise, scientific divers have interdisciplinary methodological knowledge of the possibilities and special features of underwater research and are able to apply both in a complex manner.
The training
Training at the Scientific Diving Center of the TU Bergakademie Freiberg is carried out in accordance with the ISO standards ISO 8804-1 and 8804-2. The SDC was successfully certified on 11.10.2024 by the standardization organization Austrian Standards. This makes the SDC the first institution in the world to offer certified training.
Scientific diving encompasses the application of scientific working methods at various levels and areas of application in geology, hydrogeology, geophysics, oceanology, limnology - in short, the "geosciences" -, environmental sciences, (micro)biology and ecology. Research groups in engineering, process and analytical technology as well as industrial archaeology and scientific documentation are also represented in shallow marine projects.
This enables scientific divers to combine planning, realisation, interpretation of results and evaluation work above and under water in a meaningful and effective way. For this reason, they offer a decisive advantage over unmanned systems for researching shallow marine systems.
In addition to regular training, we offer further training for special tasks and conditions. These include:
- Communication and diving with a signalling line
- Diving with a full-face mask and underwater communication system
- Diving with special breathing gas mixtures
- Education, training and further training of scientific diving instructors
