An introduction to processes and forces that form the surface and the interior of the Earth. Topics include, changes in climate, the history of life, as well as earth resources and their uses.

Cigarette smoking is a major public health problem. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Control reports that more than 80% of current adult tobacco users started smoking before age 18. The National Youth Tobacco Survey indicated that 12.8% of middle school students and 34.8% of high school students in their study used some form of tobacco products.


In ENVS 407, Penn undergraduates learn about the short and long term physiological consequences of smoking, social influences and peer norms regarding tobacco use, the effectiveness of cessation programs, tobacco advocacy and the impact of the tobacco settlement. Penn students will collaborate with teachers in West Philadelphia to prepare and deliver lessons to middle school students. The undergraduates will survey and evaluate middle school and Penn student smoking. One of the course goals is to raise awareness of the middle school children to prevent addiction to tobacco smoke during adolescence. Collaboration with the middle schools gives Penn students the opportunity to apply their study of the prevention of tobacco smoking to real world situations.

From the fall of the Roman Empire to Love Canal to the epidemics of asthma, childhood obesity and lead poisoning in West Philadelphia, the impact of the environment on health has been a continuous challenge to society. The environment can affect people's health more strongly than biological factors, medical care and lifestyle. The water we drink, the food we eat, the air we breathe, and the neighborhood we live in are all components of the environment that impact our health. Some estimates, based on morbidity and mortality statistics, indicate that the impact of the environment on health is as high as 80%. These impacts are particularly significant in urban areas like West Philadelphia. Over the last 20 years, the field of environmental health has matured and expanded to become one of the most comprehensive and humanly relevant disciplines in science.


This course will examine not only the toxicity of physical agents, but also the effects on human health of lifestyle, social and economic factors, and the built environment. Topics include cancer clusters, water borne diseases, radon and lung cancer, lead poisoning, environmental tobacco smoke, respiratory diseases and obesity. Students will research the health impacts of classic industrial pollution case studies in the US. Class discussions will also include risk communication, community outreach and education, access to health care and impact on vulnerable populations. Each student will have the opportunity to focus on Public Health, Environmental Protection, Public Policy, and Environmental Education issues as they discuss approaches to mitigating environmental health risks.


This honors seminar will consist of lectures, guest speakers, readings, student presentations, discussions, research, and community service. The students will have two small research assignments including an Environmental and Health Policy Analysis and an Industrial Pollution Case Study Analysis. Both assignments will include class presentations. The major research assignment for the course will be a problem-oriented research paper and presentation on a topic related to community-based environmental health selected by the student. In this paper, the student must also devise practical recommendations for the problem based on their research.

Pattern on the Earth's surface arise due to the transport of sediment by water and wind, with energy that is supplied by climate and tectonic deformation of the solid Earth. This course presents a treatment of the processes of erosion and deposition that shape landscapes. Emphasis will be placed on using simple physical principles as a tool for (a) understanding landscape patterns including drainage networks, river channels and deltas, desert dunes, and submarine channels, (b) reconstructing past environmental conditions using the sedimentary record, and (c) the management of rivers and landscapes under present and future climate scenarios. The course will conclude with a critical assessment of landscape evolution on other planets, including Mars.

Macroevolution, or evolution above the population level and on long timescales,as a field addresses fundamental questions about the origins of life, past and present.These include but are not limited to: How are highly dissimilar speciesrelated? Why are animals on distant continents so similar? How and when did major groups, like birds or mammals, originate? What drives evolutionary arms races? Why are there so many more species of beetle than crocodile? Why are there more species in the tropics than the arctic? Did dinosaursprevent the diversification of mammals? Why do some animals survive mass extinction? How can invasive species spread so rapidly? Students will learn importantconcepts underlying our understanding of modern biodiversity and the fossil record, as well as how to use different methods and lines of evidence, including evolutionary trees (phylogeny), fossil databases, past climate and global events,mathematical modeling, and even modern genomics, to answer fundamental questions about the evolution of life.