- Docente: Marco Bittelli
- Credits: 6
- SSD: AGR/02
- Language: Italian
- Teaching Mode: Traditional lectures
- Campus: Bologna
- Corso: First cycle degree programme (L) in Land and Agro-Forestry Technologies (cod. 5831)
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from Sep 15, 2025 to Dec 17, 2025
Learning outcomes
At the end of the course the student knows the basics of ecology, the main meteorological quantities and the interactions between plant organisms in agro-ecosystems. It is able to carry out measurements and processing of meteorological and climatic data, calculate water balances and the water requirements of the main crops. It is able to collect, interpret and communicate data and information to formulate autonomous judgments and reflections on current environmental issues of agricultural interest and on eco-sustainable agriculture.
Course contents
Introduction
1. Fundamentals of solar radiation. Electromagnetic spectrum, blackbody radiation, emissivity, albedo, cosine law, radiation attenuation, spectral distribution of blackbody radiation.
2. Radiative fluxes (solar angles, declination, solar traces, direct and diffuse radiation, irradiance, emissivity, absortivity). Measurement of solar radiation (radiometers, pyranometers). Use of software for estimating solar radiation at a territorial level.
3. Temperature, temperature measurement, temperature and heat fluxes in the soil, temperature and biological development, thermal sums.
4. Water vapor and other gases. Concepts of saturated and unsaturated vapor pressure, dew point.
5. Relationship between water, organisms and their environment. Water potential and content, potentials in organisms and the environment, relationships between liquid and gas phases.
6. Wind. Atmospheric boundary layer, turbulence, vortices, vectors.
7. Mass and energy transport in biophysical systems. Conductances.
8. Water movement in soils.
9. Plants and plant communities.
10. Milankovitch cycles. Greenhouse gases, paleoclimate measurements, terrestrial energy balance.
Readings/Bibliography
Soil Physics with Python (Bittelli, Campbell and Tomei). Oxford University Press (ISBN: 9780198854791)
An Introduction to Environmental Biophsyics (Campbell and Norman). Springer (ISBN: 0387949372)
Class notes and computer codes
Teaching methods
Lessons in class, computer exercises, lab and field training.
Assessment methods
Written exam. The exam will be divided into two partials. The first will be held in the middle of the semester (early November) and the final at the end of the semester (around mid-December). Each of the two partial exams consists of 5 questions, each of which is worth 6 points. There are 3 qualitative-descriptive questions and 2 exercises. Students who cannot take it will have subsequent appeals with a single exam.
Teaching tools
Algoritmi e modelli
Links to further information
Office hours
See the website of Marco Bittelli